


Waking Up

by Kittywitch



Series: A Society of Academics [3]
Category: Doctor Who
Genre: AU, Alternate Universe - Steampunk, F/F, F/M, Gen, M/M, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-21
Updated: 2015-12-05
Packaged: 2018-03-18 20:12:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 42,219
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3582384
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kittywitch/pseuds/Kittywitch
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In this instalment of the Society of Academics AU, nearly every Doctor Who character features somewhere as an alternate version of London wakes up and greets the day.<br/>Wives and husbands leave their beds, young ladies run to school, pirates start their airships, and twelve professors make their way to the blue academy building that brings all of these stories together.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Belltower Strikes Five

At five a clock, the world was dim and gray. Through the dormitory shared by the professors and the college grounds beyond, the world was silent. A variety of men and women slumbered in a variety of beds, lying still as if they had been frozen in time. A long, slim line of golden light crept over the gabled roofs of the city and touched the clockface above the Prussian blue dormitory.  
And slowly, the world began to wake up.

A tavern leaned uneasily against a second building few streets across town, just far enough that the parents of the college weren’t too upset about the seedy nature of the establishment. But just close enough that the students went there anyway. Leaning just as uneasily on each other, three figures exited the tavern. In the centre was a woman in a worn violet dress and a spotted stole, dyed to look like leopard but plainly made of a couple of rabbits that had died while the last king was still on the throne. An enormous scarlet hat with tattered plumes, which nearly blinded her taller companions, covered hair that was still arguably blond.

She attempted to lead the two men on either side in a bawdy song, but as she was making it up as she was going along, neither of them knew the words. The man to her left was wide but not fat, with dark curly hair and a beard cut into stripes. Had he been accompanied by anyone else he would have been recognisably drunk. He wore the grubby, motley cross of garish clothing and armour that people associated with those terrible sky pirates who kept insisting on mooring in the city. 

The man to her right was younger than the other two, or at least he looked it. He had a clean-cut, handsome face, a gray coat, and an American accent. He at least attempted to sing along with his companion, but as he had been drinking himself and had no way to know the words, the best be could do was hum along. He did so loudly and brashly, covering the woman’s voice with his attempts to harmonise. What words he could catch, he repeated. Some time after she sang them.

“….mmm mmm dum dum de da…. _you’d damn her to the devil, but she’s already there…”_

“Wait a minute, wait a minute…” asked the first man. “Where are we going?”

“What was that?” asked the American.

“I said, where are we going?” he repeated.

“To hell if we don’t change our ways, eh, Glitzy?” the woman laughed, leaning closer to bearded man.

“Don’t you go gettin’ coy with me, Iris.” he retorted, shaking his head.

“Oh, I’m not half coy yet, Glitzy! You ought to wait until I’ve had a few!”

“A few?” the American laughed. “So what we that bottle you emptied half past three?”

“A tittle.” the woman said matter-of-factly. All three of them laughed at this as only the intoxicated can.

“So, either of you coming back to my ship with me?” the American asked with a flirtatious smile. He blared it like a signal light at first the woman, then the man.

 

“You ain’t getting me tonight, Jack, the _Nostferatu’s_ sailin’ today.” Glitz answered simply. “We drank to the flight, remember?”

“With what we were drinking, I wouldn’t be half surprised if he didn’t remember anythin’ after we took to the table.” Iris laughed.

“I remember the table.” said Jack. “And I remember pulling you off it, Iris.” 

The three laughed again. 

 

“You’ll both come and see me next time you land, won’t you, boys?” said Iris, stretching up on tiptoe to place a drunken, sticky kiss on Jack’s cheek and another somewhere in Glitz’s beard.

“Good morning, Iris. Stay out of trouble.” said Jack cheerfully.

“You know I won’t!” 

Jack let go of Iris, who wobbled slightly as she tried to catch her own footing, and took her chin in his hand to kiss her more steadily on the lips. As she cooed with delight, fanning herself slightly, he did the same to Glitz, who was completely unfazed by this.

“Good morning, Glitz. Feel free to send up your striped flag anytime the _Torchwood_ and the _Nosferatu_ cross paths. I’ll send a board across.”

“Just so long as you wait for my flag this time, lad.” Glitz replied, pointing cheekily at Jack. Jack and Iris both stared at him expectantly.

“What? I already kissed you both.” said the third member nonchalantly. Jack raised his eyebrow and Iris looked despondent. 

“I kissed you, that’s not the same thing.” Jack argued. Glitz rolled his eyes.

“Oh, go on then.” Glitz shrugged. He stopped a brief, friendly kiss on each of their mouths and detached from the group. “I’ll call on you next time we land, Iris.”

“You do that, Glitzy, you do that!” she tittered. The woman patted the American’s hand and removed it from her arm.

“You two run along, I think I’ll get one more drink for the road.”

“Oh, come off it, Iris.” the bearded man said. “The sun’s up, they’ll close soon.”

“Oh, you don’t know me womanly wiles. I can get one more drink out of them.”

“I know enough of yer wiles to know you ain’t gettin’ another drink tonight.”

“She can’t get another drink tonight.” said the American.

“Just you watch me, Capt’n.” the woman exclaimed, shaking a finger at him.

“You can’t, because it’s five in the morning.” he explained, but she had already turned around and gone back into the public house. 

 

“So is anyone coming back to my ship with me?” the young-looking man repeated.

“Captain Harkness!” called a voice somewhere behind the drunks. The American blinked, and looked around in surprise.

Standing behind him was a stocky youth with bright eyes and fair hair gathered under their cap. They were putting on a Yorkshire accent poorly enough that the American could tell it was put on. The captain had talked to her briefly, but not long enough to establish whether she was dressed as a boy to get a job or to look for women in the pub, and he wasn’t entirely sure whether or not she thought that her accent or her disguise was fooling anyone.

 

“I’m Charley. The deckhand.” the youth explained. “The one who wanted work.” 

“Charley who wanted work. Now I remember you.” he said, turning his winning smile onto her. 

“You want a kiss too, Charley-boy?” Jack grinned. Charley flushed red.

“I—I’ll pass for today, captain.” she stuttered.He was perfectly happy with whichever role she wanted to take, and preferably if she was amenable to taking it with him. But for now, he figured it was probably polite if nothing else to address her as him until otherwise asked.

Charley’s smile was a bit weaker, and she began to wonder exactly how effective her disguise actually was. Before she could doubt her decision much more, the captain clapped her shoulder warmly and gestured grandly towards where his airship was moored.

“I think I can get that arranged, Charley-boy.” grinned Jack. “We could always use another hand on the _Torchwood._ ”

“That sounds just fine t’me, captain.” the youth replied in her too-thick to be real accent. “I likes to keep myself busy, I do.”

“Have you ever worked on an airship, Charley?”

“Once.” she answered, her accent faltering slightly. “But it was a very brief flight.”

 

 

Not seven minutes later, when the landlord had finished letting Miss Wyldthyme know precisely what he thought of her “womanly wiles”, the lush found herself back on the street without another sip of gin in her. As the dashing pirates she had been drinking with had retired to their respective ships, she had no choice but to start making her way home as well.  
Just as soon as she remembered which way that was.

 

Halfway across the city, the first movements started in the teacher’s dormitories. A scrappy, tow-headed form half sprang, half tumbled from his bed. Dr. Davison rubbed his eyes furiously, then rolled his shoulders and raised his arms above his head. He swung his body about, stretching in all directions at once. He was the first person awake in his apartment, as usual. Very few people were interested in moving at five-thirty in the morning unless they had already been moving at five. And usually, not unless they’d been moving at four as well.  
There was really nothing he could do to convince his wards of the benefits of rising early and taking a healthy constitutional, and he had come to accept that. Still, that gave him time to bathe, dress, get a quick dash around the quad, and get a start on breakfast before his apartment became thick with loud young persons dashing every which way. He tied his dressing gown and began a spritely march down the hallway.

 

While most of Dr. Davison’s coworkers lived at the college, there were a few notable exceptions. Largely, the Bakers. The Bakers were probably the most respectable family to enter academia. Or at least they had been, before this latest set of brothers. But eccentric academics aside, the Bakers still kept a country home, a townhouse and the various staff that entailed. Cooks, footmen, butlers, valets, house-maids, parlour-maids, under house parlour maids.  
And one rather over-qualified nanny.  
Miss Bush, the Bakers’ nanny, was another early riser. And another firm believer in the benefits of exercise. At the moment, she was bouncing on her heels and punching at the air, still in her nightdress and her curly red hair escaping from under her sleeping cap. She sang a cheery little song to herself to keep herself on beat, like a child skipping rope.  
“…pease pottage hot, pease pottage cold, pease pottage in a pot nine days old…”  
She had not only held many jobs in her short twenty years, but also excelled in nearly all of them. She worked on the stage as a child, learning to sing and dance very gracefully. Sometime after that, she spent several years working with punch-card tabulation, where her eidetic memory came into good use. Sadly, when the local college began using these machines, they quickly shifted students to the manual labour of running them and relieved most of the tabulators of their employment. Instead of starting with the older men who had taken this ladylike job because they couldn’t handle heavy lifting, they released the bright young girls who would almost certainly be better off working in service or finding a husband. This is a conclusion easily reached if you are an older gentleman working at a desk job at a college and have never been a young woman in service.  
While this was a factor in her securing a job in the household of one of the college’s professors, it was far from the main reason. Only herself, her employer, and his wife knew the exact reason she was currently employed as a nanny. There was no way to tell if the child himself knew the reason, because he was still confined to his cot. The boy also had every appearance of being a penguin; but that never seemed to come up.  
“…pease pottage hot, pease pottage cold, pease pottage in a pot eight days old…” she sang, curls bouncing as she moved.

 

The tram conductor rolled his eyes in exasperation. This was his last round of the night, and he didn’t have the patience to humour this clearly drunk woman any longer than he already had. He had to finish this round and get a start on the part of his job he actually liked before six, and it was already five-forty. The longer he spent arguing with an old woman, the less time he got to tinker with the engine.

“Lookit love, you either got a token or you don’t, an’ I don’t really have the time to sit around wit’ the door open an’ wait while you yatter on about the weather.”  
“But it is bone cold, Mr. Drax. ”  
Mr. Drax rolled his eyes. This wasn’t the first morning he had met with Miss Wyldthyme or the first time they had this conversation. He knew the colour of her knickers but not the colour of her money, as he had only seen one of those items and it wasn’t the one he had wanted to see.  
“Please Mr. Drax, it’s been such a long night an’ I don’t know ‘ow I’m gettin’ home without a bit of help…”  
“An’ I don’t know either, because if you ain’t got a tram token, you ain’t ridin’ this tram ‘ome.”  
“Are you sure there isn’t anyfing you could do for me? For old time’s sake, Mr. Drax…” As she spoke, her grip on her skirt tightened as if she wasn’t aware of it, but as the edge of her skirt cleared the top of her boots, the conductor became increasingly sure that the old woman knew precisely what she was doing.  
“Bird, there’s a lot I would do to make you not lift that skirt any ‘igher, but none of it is givin’ ya a free ride. Worth more than my job, that is.”

Just two seats down from this discussion were the only two paying passengers on the tram; two chorus girls on their way home from the last show of the night. They were crammed together like a full week’s change of clothes in a carpetbag, though there was plenty of room this early in the morning. Their makeup was cloudy and smudged, the dark haired one trying to hide how old she really was while the ginger tried to hide how young she was. Each had nearly been falling asleep on the other’s shoulder before the conductor started this conversation with the drunk, and now turned their attention to pointedly not turning their attention to this spectacle.

The ginger spoke in quiet tones to her friend, though everyone on the tram could hear her nonetheless.  
“Do you think we’ve got a spare token between us?”  
“No, we’ve got tomorrow’s tokens and the next day’s.” said the older woman.  
“But Tamsin, she’ll stand there and argue til the sun’s up if she can’t get a ride home, and I want to be back in me bed now.” Amelia argued. “Let’s just pay her way so we can all get home.”  
“She drank her ride home, I can smell that from back here!” Tamsin hissed. “Leave her alone! Sticking your nose where it doesn’t belong is going to be the end of you, Amy. Sammy’s always saying that.”  
“Samantha Jones is a git!” Amelia stated loudly, as if she were reciting facts for an oral exam.  
“She likes you.”  
“She hates me. She hates every girl in the chorus.”  
“She doesn’t hate us, she just thinks she’s the best dancer in the chorus.”  
“It’s the same thing.” pouted Amelia, straightening her coat and glancing at the front of the bus. She frowned.  
“Now the old woman’s looking at us.”  
“Don’t talk to her, Amelia.”  
“She can hear us.” the ginger pointed out.  
“Look at her!” Tamsin whispered. “How many years before that’s us, eh?”  
“That’s why we should help her!”  
“Not if we have any hope of finding work that will take us at her age! You’ve still got five years of dancing in you, but I’m closer to that than I ever hoped to get. We need to cut corners or else we’ll end up on ‘em.”  
“I’m not gonna be on a corner when I’m old. My Rory’s going to be a proper doctor by then.”  
“And I suppose you’ll have settled on being his wife proper by then?”  
Amy’s mouth opened like a fish out of water, but she was saved from having to answer by Miss Wildthyme interrupting the conversation.  
“D’you think that either one of you luvvies might lend an old lady a tram token?” Iris called. Amy looked like she might speak for a moment, but as Tamsin shook her head, Amy found herself shaking hers as well. The conductor smiled in a way that suggested he wasn’t quite as sorry as all that and started the tram up again.  
“Sorry, luv,” said Mr. Drax. “Catch the next one, yeah?”

 

It was common knowledge that Dr. Davison was the earliest riser among his colleagues. It was common speculation that this accounted for why he was such a terse, and somewhat under-slept, young man. He was the second-youngest professor who actually made use of the academy club. The very-youngest professor was a mere twenty-five and often mistaken for one of the students. The very-youngest of the professors was a somewhat silly young man answering to Dr. Smith.  
Dr. Smith also woke up fairly early, but upon discovering that it was not yet six, he thought better of the entire situation and dropped back into bed. The assortment of pillows and stuffed bears that filled his bed covered him like an avalanche until the young doctor had disappeared entirely. This was perhaps made more possible by the fact that his bed was, in fact, not a proper bed at all, but a hammock suspended by the bedposts his father had left him. Dr. Smith had always been firmly of the opinion that a hammock was a far superior form of bed. And it was so, if one wanted to disappear entirely under an avalanche of stuffed bears. The only way to improve a hammock, thought Dr. Smith, was to combine it with a bunk bed. And he did so.  
He rarely had company overnight.


	2. The Belltower Strikes Six

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A few more characters start to wake up and move around. This chapter features five, Mickey Smith, Martha Jones, Evelyn Smythe, Flip Jackson, eight, the warlock, the sixth master, C'Rizz, Amy Pond, and Rory Williams, all very briefly.

At six, Dr. Davison had finished his morning constitutional and changed into a burgundy dressing gown. Aside from a rather lost-looking German shepherd, he had been the only living thing moving around the college quad before six, which was just as he liked it. Once, the young doctor had attempted to take his constitutional between classes, with the disastrous side effect of being stopped every three minutes by either a colleague who wanted to know what precisely he was doing, a student with a question about one of his lectures, or other less well-meaning schoolboys who had assumed that a clean-living professor with all of coarse presence of a gold retriever puppy would be an easy mark for a schoolboy prank. These particular boys had never taken one of Dr. Davison’s classes. His student could have told them that Dr. Davison could do a great deal more when riled than squeak like a fifteen-year-old girl or a small dog, though to be fair, he also did that.

While Dr. Davison did have quite large living quarters for an unmarried professor, he had taken on so many wards that the rooms always seemed far too small to fit whoever happened to be rushing from one room to another. He had attempted to lay down certain rules: that they all needed to observe a strict curfew, that they stay clean and sober, and that they share meals in the evening and morning. 

His eldest seemed most insistent that the boys remained in their bedroom after bedtime and that the girls kept to theirs, but Dr. Davison himself never saw any particular reason to enforce this himself because the worst that could come from it would be Adric, his youngest boy, getting a black eye. Still, the young professor did rather wish that he could get them to take a greater interest in physical health, as it was one of his specialties at the college. Even so, there was little he could do to get them out of bed before seven, despite the fact that three of them were still taking classes and his eldest ward was working as a conductorette on an airbus, all of which meant they needed to be somewhere else by the time any of Dr. Davison’s classes began.

 

The tall, fair-haired man entered the washroom, fully aware what a commodity it would shortly become and intending to take great enjoyment out of not rushing through his bath. He locked the door, quite unnecessary as no one else was awake, and hung his cream-coloured suit on the back of the door. The hot water rushed noisily into the china bath, filling the washroom with thick white steam. In theory, this would press out any wrinkles in his suit before he wore it, but as he usually dressed before the suit cooled, it had yet to be fully effective. His personal effects remained on his bedside table where he had undressed the night before: two brass pocket-watches, his favourite panama hat with driving goggles left around the band, pencil with a copper holder, a commonplace book, a handkerchief, pocketknife, an assortment of keys for doors, clocks, machines, and vehicles (about half of which he knew the precise location of at any given time) each on their own link in a motley copper, brass, and bronze chain, and a small green glass vial with copper casing which held a spouting cutting of celery in a hydroponic solution. This assortment of effects also contained a ball of string, a copper nail, several sweets wrappers, and old spring that somehow ended up in his pocket over the course of the previous day. Dr. Davison had every intention of putting them back into his pockets when he dressed, as he might well need them again. Also among his personal effects was a worn, brown leather belt which had once been an arming belt before the young doctor decided it was just the thing for carrying the various objects he kept with him in case he had the chance to tinker.  Dr. Davison was quite a keen tinkerer, and the one room that his wards did not have free rein to come and go as they pleased in his quarters was his workroom, where even now what may have been his greatest project covered what had previously been his desk.

 

But that project was the furthest thing from his mind at the moment. Now, Dr. Davison had only the goal of cleaning the perspiration from his morning exercise off of his body and attempting to let a notch or two slip from his proverbial winding key. The man was tightly-wound as clockwork and just as likely to break when jostled. Truth be told, the young professor probably needed a good deal more than a bath to help with that, but a bath was all he time for this morning. And it would be a brief bath at that.

 

 

 

 

High above the city, an airship hung in the air like a child’s balloon on a string. It was still moored to a signal tower, but today was the day it put off for France.  There were any number of doctors with an assortment of the most advanced degrees rolling over in their beds beneath them, but here, where the morning fog met the clouds, there was only one doctor, and she hadn’t an official degree of any sort. She had studied at a medical college in India for a brief time, but the ship on which she was serving had set off before she could take her exam. She leaned casually on the railing on the port side, letting the updraft from beneath the airship touch her face. Her hair was pulled back severely, her clothing worn and mismatched and resembling nothing so much as a bicycling habit with light leather armour, but her face was beautiful: sculpted and dark and serene as a figurehead staring down at the world below. She smiled faintly, but sadly, like she was deep in thought; not seeing the world below her but something much further away.

 

“Don’t fall asleep yet, Martha, your shift’s nearly over.” 

Martha half-turned, keeping one hand on the railing. She smiled, her eyes brightening through the evidence she hadn’t slept since noon the previous day. If she kept to that schedule, she would only get six hours of sleep. Again.

Mickey Smith, the ship’s engineer, returned the smile and carefully walked across the gently shifting deck with a steaming tin mug in each hand.

“Is that coffee, Mic? You’re a prince.” Martha asked. 

“And just in time.” he added. “You look ready to fall asleep on your feet.”

“I can’t do that, not now you’re here.”

“Happy to see me?” the man grinned cheekily. She smiled back at him, straightened his lapels and expertly relieved him of one of the cups of coffee as he went in for a kiss.

“That, and you’re standing in the place I’d take a nap.” 

 

She hadn’t properly realised how cold her fingers were until they were wrapped around the cup. Warmth flooded her insides before she was aware of taking the first gulp. It wasn’t exactly a gourmet roast, but he’d mixed it black with double sugar, like she always had her first cup in the morning.

 

“Now why is it you keep takin’ the night shift?” he asked, settling his hips against the railing.

“It’s quiet, I can read a bit while I’m watching.”

“I would think you’d run out of books by now.”

“Not if I’m trying to memorise them.” she pointed out. Her back straightened, and she recited:

“ _‘Swamp Alder: Pharmaceutical Preparations:  I. Decoction. Simmer an ounce of the bark in a pint of water till half a pint has been evaporated. Dose, a fluid drachm three or four times a day. II. Sirup. Macerate three pounds of crushed bark in cold water for six hours; put into a percolator, and add water till five pints have passed over (see Percolation;) put over a slow fire and stir in eight pounds of sugar till dissolved. When cold, add a pint of whisky. Dose, a fluid ounce three or four times a day. Various compound sirups are made, as with dicentra, rumex, etc.’_ ”

“…that’s a very useful thing to know word-for-word, I’m sure.”

“You come back and say that when you’re covered in scrofula.”

 

She turned toward him again, fondly touching his cheek.

“You’re a mess. Did you really just get up?”

“No, I had to bring coffee, eggs and bacon, and a copy of the London Times to my other wife first, I’ve been up for hours.” he answered with a causal shrug. Martha tried not to dignify that with a laugh and cover her grin with the tin coffee cup.

“Tell me I’m not going to find the bed covered over in engine grease again.” she rolled her eyes again. “I keep telling you to scrub up a bit before you go to bed.”

“There’s no more there than there was when you got up.” he answered evenly. She rolled her eyes and shook her head, but that was mostly to stop from laughing at him.

 

The couple looked pensively from the ship’s deck once more, touching their coffee cups to their mouths but not actually drinking.

“Mickey?” Martha asked softly, looking out over the sleeping city.

“Yes?”

“Do you ever miss it?”

“What, doing menial labour for half it’s worth?” he replied.

“Not that.” Martha spat the words out like a rotten bite of an apple. “Do you think I miss working for half a living wage to scrub floors? Or not being able to go to a proper nursing college and having to scrounge an education out of my employer’s library between making beds?”

She took a long draught of coffee to collect herself.

“Sorry, babe. I didn’t mean to change gears like that.” Mickey said quickly.

“I know you didn’t, I just—”

“I know how you can get, I shouldn’t have teased.” he said by way of an apology, “You know what I was doing before I came up here: running the machines for a _different_ handsome white man with a long list of admirers. At least with Jack, people admit the engines area a _pretty vital_ part of the ship.”

“Ah, don’t forget he likes you to call him ‘Captain’.”

“I know what Jack likes.” said Mickey, trying not to smile. A worried expression crossed his face briefly. “A bit more than I intended to, but that’s just ‘cause boundaries are something that happens to other people.”

He caught her eye to see if that would make her laugh, and was gratified to see it had.

“But you know what? I’ll take it. Up here no one looks at me and says, ‘What, really?’ No one was surprised to see me turn pirate.”

“I was.” said Martha.

“That’s different, you weren’t making assumptions.” Mickey explained. “It wasn’t that you didn’t take me seriously, it’s that you knew me enough to know the side of the law I was familiar with.”

“The side you agreed with!” Martha pointed out. “That hasn’t changed at all.”

“Hasn’t it?”

“Don’t pretend you’d be following Jack for a minute if you thought he was actually doing anything wrong.”

“He must be. He’s a pirate, isn’t he?” asked Mickey. “I’m alright with Jack. He may be a pirate, but he isn’t a genius and he isn’t self-righteous.” he replied evenly. Mickey took another drink of coffee and tried to mask the bitter expression that followed the bitter draught.

“Truth is, I got pretty tired of hearing that Dr. Tennent was a great man for only _occasionally_ forgetting I was living one.”

“Don’t go on like that, Mic, you’ll start me another one of my rants.”

“I like your rants.” Mickey smiled. “The way you talk about how the world should be better makes me think it actually could be.” He leaned forward and touched his forehead to hers.

 

“Thanks for keeping me up.”

“Thanks for keeping me moored.” she replied.

“We’re sky folk, you and me. Air pirates, the captain says.” Mickey almost laughed. “Why do you need to keep grounded?”

“Why are we moored here?” she replied. 

 

 

 

 

 

Far below the airship _Torchwood,_ the first figures began their movement in the Baker residence. There was a sort of unwritten rule about the staff of large houses like this, certain roles that needed to be filled by various characters. The flirty footmen, gossiping maids, that one ladies’ maid with the jumped-up graces like she thought was a lady herself. And of course, the pushy but caring cook, motherly without ever actually having been a mother herself, and her long-suffering kitchen maid. In the Baker household, these roles were taken by two women who wore the expectations like dresses that didn’t quite fit; borrowed personas that only helped when being underestimated was actually helpful. The cook was called Mrs. Smythe despite the fact she’d never been married and actually qualified for a doctorate, because she wound up as the cook in a large important house and cooks in large important houses were called “Mrs.”. Her  kitchen maid, currently checking the heat of the oven, was named Phipilla Jackson and not self-conscious about the fact that she wasn’t as overqualified as most of the house staff, despite some of their better efforts. 

 

“Well, is it up to heat yet?” the cook demanded, not turning around from the kettle she was filling.

“Almost, Mrs. Smythe.”

“We can’t get the baking started on ‘almost’, Flip. We’d best get some of the lemon cake from yesterday out of the cupboard. A bit of cream on that, should be a fine end to breakfast.”

“Ah, of course. More cake.”

“Yes, dear, more cake. I know you’ve got your eyes on my cake recipe. You want to be a cook one day, don’t you? Take my job?”

“…not really…” Phipilla admitted. Mrs. Smythe stopped bustling long enough to look deeply offended.

“All I want to know is why you serve cake at every meal.” Phipilla asked, going on the tips of her toes to get a copper bowl from off the ceiling.

“That’s simple.” said the cook, putting the kettle on the stove. “I’ve been in this family since Dr. Baker and Dr. Baker were lads. Cake seemed the only thing those boys would agree on, so I always made sure there was plenty of it about.”

“Ah.” said Phipilla, pausing in her work to smile wryly. “And what about Dr. Baker?”

“Ol’ Pip likes his cake too, just now he likes it in the country.” Mrs. Smythe laughed. “He has me send him a tin every time one of his boys goes up to visit him. Not that it’s often, course…”

Mrs. Smythe looked off into an invisible vista somewhere over the cooking range, suddenly looking very tired indeed.

“If I had sons like that, I’d stay in the country, too…”

 

 

 

 

Pretty, pleasant grey eyes opened and fixed on a point on the ceiling, immediately trying to remember whose ceiling it was and how the sleeper came to be there. He pushed a mess of sort brown waves out of his eyes and tried to get the room to come into focus. While nothing in the room was less than excellent, the state of the room was little less than complete chaos. There was a satin waistcoat hanging over the back of an brocade armchair, books cluttering its seat. One of the curtains was missing. There was a cut-glass bowl full of brightly coloured candies and a small machine which he _thought_ was used to shoot nets at people (but he wasn’t in a hurry to test it) on top of the dresser. The top drawer was open and five slightly different pairs of driving goggles hung over the edge. A very nice pair of dress shoes sat banked on top of a shoe shine box, but by the look of it the box had not been opened or put to use for at least two weeks. Just beyond the dove-grey comforter, a pocket watch was sitting open so that either the time or the inscription inside could be read from the bed. It was six-thirty, and the watch belonged to a man called Dr. Paul McGann.

 

The world came back to him in drips and drabbles, then all at once. This was his bed, his room, and his watch. He was a professor at a local university, and—he sat up and saw a handkerchief embroidered with a question mark—a member of an exclusive club currently open to only twelve members of the faculty. Or was it thirteen? Wasn’t someone cast out, or left for some noble reason, or—that wasn’t important right now. The name on his pocket watch and his paycheques was McGann, and he had completely lost his memory twice since moving to London. If he’d done so any earlier, he couldn’t say, because at the moment his memory at it’s best only went back to being shipwrecked near San Fransisco.

Dr. McGann sat up in his bed, comfortable in the thought that he had at least as much of his memory as he went to sleep with. Whether or not the gaps were in the same places wasn’t consequential, the important part was that he had to work that day and as such ought to get dressed for it.

 

 

 

 

Dr. McGann was quite right that someone had left the number of the Society of Academics, even if he didn’t remember their name, or face, or why they left at the moment. He didn’t even remember that the thirteenth (or ninth, depending on how they were counted), absent member had not only left the club, but the college, the city, and society altogether. Even if Dr. McGann _had_ remembered the thirteenth member, he wouldn’t have been able to find his hermitage and see an old, weathered man standing at the mouth of a cave.

Hurt the Hermit (that was his surname, if asked he would very much prefer if one did not actually hurt the hermit) stood at the edge of the cave where he had slept and watched the sunbeams rise over the town. Several yards away, a wolf waited at the edge of the forest and stared into the hermit’s cave. Neither moved. Hurt rewarded the wolf, and the wolf regarded him.

 

“I could leave, you know.” he said softly. He listened to the way the words ended, eaten by the silence around him. The wolf didn’t react to the man speaking, but continued to stare at him as if it knew something dreadfully important.

“I shouldn’t think anyone would notice if I did. I’m not entirely sure if anyone remembers that I was set to guard this place.” 

 

The hermit’s cave remained dark, as if the rosy beams of sunrise paused at the mouth and decided they hadn’t the time to learn how deep the cave was, and what it was that the Hermit had been set to guard, so long ago that his beard turned grey and no one but he remembered that he guarded it.

“…the life of an ascetic hasn’t quite suited me the way I supposed it would.” said Hurt, staring past the woods and over the city beyond. A city full of people he hadn’t spoken to in years.

The wolf sat gracelessly on its haunches and yawned widely.

“You’re no sort of help at all, are you?” Hurt asked with mild annoyance.

 

 

 

 

It was six thirty-eight when brother C’Rizz woke up. He woke up for the same reason he usually did, the patients’ room were right under his and the patient in room number six was pounding on the walls of his cell. The brother barely had time to pull his trousers on before the newly-installed internal telephone system that no doubt had mother Katz on the other end, ready to tell C’Rizz that patient number six was pounding on the walls of his cell. Fumbling for the receiver, he knocked the handset to the ground where it bounced on the cord like a spring. 

 

“I _can_ hear him, you know.” he muttered, taking advantage of the fact that while the speaker was at his ear the handset was somewhere around his feet. He slowly pulled it back up as mother Katz shrilled on the other end of the internal telephone.

“ _…need you to go and check on master Simm before he wakes up the entire ward!_ ”

“I’ll be down in just a minute.”

“ _You haven’t got a minute! Can’t you hear the racket he’s making? Our more sensitive patients-_ ”

“…have all been moved away from room six long ago.” C’rizz finished, resettling the phone and getting off of his bed. He’d fallen asleep in his trousers, and quickly shoving his feet into boots without socks he began a quick rummage around for enough clothing to be proper. 

 

The brother ran through the halls of the lunatic asylum, buttoning his shirt as he ran.  In all probability, when mother Katz caught up, she would take offence at his state of dress, but she wouldn’t catch up until the man in room number six had stopped beating out a rhythm on the walls of his room. In the pause between the pounding, C’rizz could hear other patients crying or screaming as they were woken by the noise master Simm was making.

 

_Thud-thud, thud-thud.  “_ Ieeee!” _Thud-thud, thud-thud._ “Why? Why‽” _Thud-thud, thud-thud._ “My dreeeeams-” _Thud-thud, thud-thud._ “-of conquest!” _Thud-thud, thud-thud._

 

 

 

 

Mr. Williams—still not _Doctor_ Williams until at least another two years of study—knew he should not have gotten married before he could have supported his wife. He explained this to her, and carefully annotated each point of his logic, arguing his position with beautiful and loving clarity right up to the altar. He couldn’t stand her paying for their rent and his school, even on days when he assured himself that there was nothing untoward about working in a theatre, even being a chorus girl, so long as you did your job and left it behind at the theatre and no where near that weird invert Jago. Of course, once that happened, he had seen considerably less of her by the month. He stared at the bowl of porridge he was supposed to be eating, and the trail of cinnamon half-stirred into it. It faded into the bottom of the bowl like a road fades into the distance, and somewhere deep in his mind, Rory Williams was walking that road. He had started his life, the life he always wanted, with a respectable profession and a beautiful wife he completely loved. But it felt so much like his life hadn’t started at all, like this was all a footnote, an asterisk explaining the background of a minor character who hadn’t yet been introduced to the main story.

 

This belittling line of thought was broken by a key in the lock of the door. He looked up and found a weak smile forming on the edges of his mouth despite himself. A small, slender woman with bright red hair opened the door and crammed herself into the room. She seemed surprised to see the man she shared the room with eating breakfast in the front room.

“Rory, what are you doing up this early?”

“It’s only—” he quickly checked his  pocket-watch. “Six-forty. Lots of people have breakfast at six-forty.”

“No one who has a choice in the matter.” Amy huffed, dropping into the chair Rory wasn’t occupying.

“Would you like something-” Rory began, turning around in his seat. She put a hand on his should and pushed him back into place.

“What I would like is to talk to you for a little bit before you go to work.” she insisted. He smiled fondly at her.

“Besides-“ Amy began, taking the laden spoon out of Rory’s porridge and putting it in her mouth. “I couldn’t eat right now anyway. I’m going to sleep in ten minutes.”

 

 

 

 

As Amy was getting into bed, Dr. McGann brushed out his long, chocolate-brown hair. He had to get an early start today. Waiting on his desk at the university was an entry on deep-sea lifeforms awaiting annotation. He’d managed to get it written only two weeks after the university newsletter needed it for publishing, and once he finished the annotation it would be ready to submit. Of course, this was assuming that he didn’t forget about it and leave it on his desk for another two months. But he was quite sure that wouldn’t happen this time, as it was practically finished. The reason that it was practically finished was of course because it was supposed to be published in the last newsletter, but he’d lost track of it. Fortunately, Dr. McGann wasn’t the only man at the college who was a bit absent minded and this issue had been delayed another two weeks. However, few men at any university managed to be absent-minded with quite the regularity or panache of Dr. McGann. But, he assured himself pulling the last strand of his glorious mane into place, _this_ month he would get published. _This_ month, he wouldn’t think of something to add to his article at the last moment and start editing again. But as he shrugged into his satin waistcoat and hurried along with his dressing, a feeling of unease began to gnaw at the back of his mind. Yes, he would remember to get that article to the university publishers, but would he remember the other things he needed to do that day? When _was_ his first class of the morning? What exactly was it he was supposed to be teaching? Would going into work early give him enough time to edit that article? He was quite sure he’d planned out his morning and the early start, but he couldn’t help feeling he’d forgotten something he was supposed to do first.

The young doctor drummed his bare toes on the dusty carpet and tried to remember what it was he was forgetting.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I always have such a hard time in writing steampunk universes in trying to decide whether to make the world a better one, socially speaking, than the actual historical period, or to point out how dangerous that line of thought can be for people.  
> I'm still not sure how I feel about the decision to make this AU the level of not-terribly-progessive that it is. I think that Martha should have at least been a nurse for a while before she became a pirate, largely because in canon Martha had such a horrible time of it, and fans treat her poorly, and I just want to see her happy for a minute. That was a lot of the thought in her scene with Mickey, they are both great characters who got short sticks both in canon and reception, and I want so much better for them.  
> Amy as well, was not taken as seriously as she could have been, and I'm not sure how I feel about the decision to echo her situation by making her a chorus girl. Maybe I'll improve their situations later, after all, in the beginning of a story characters should want something.
> 
> The scene with Flip and Evelyn was intended to echo Chimes of Midnight in a humorous fashion, and while that is a little obscure, I think I can get away with making a Big Finish joke with Big Finish characters.


	3. The Belltower Strikes Seven

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Between the hours of seven and eight, Dr. Davison, three of his wards, Sergeant Benton, Captain Yates, Captain Osgood, Ben Jackson, Dr. McGann, Dr. Baker, Dr. Baker, Mrs. Baker, Miss Bush, Frobisher, “Kanis Lupis” the half-automation hound, Charley Pollard, Martha Smith (ne Jones), Mickey Smith, Jack Harkness, Stephen Taylor, miss Chaplet, miss Wyldthyme, Dr. Troughton, Polly, Jamie, Ben, Osgood, Susan, Dr. Hartnell, and Dr. McCoy all get up and get ready for their very different days.

 

 

A small, carved bird leapt out if its trapdoor, and a tiny bellows that was supposed to sound precisely like a particular breed of woodland partridge blasted out seven tuneless notes. As it happened, it didn’t sound very much like any breed of partridge but vaguely sounded like a bird. Of some sort. Which was good enough for Dr. Davison, he only purchased the clock to tell the time. Dr. Davison folded his newspaper and stood up from the table. He didn’t relish the task before him, but all that could be done for it was to put it behind him.

 

At the end of what passed for a hall in Dr. Davison’s rooms, two doors faced one another. On the first door, a small brass plaque read “N & T”, while the door opposite bore an identical in all respects except for the fact it read “A & T”. When he first ordered the plaques, the initials were reversed until he saw the boy’s initials written down. Dr. Davison wasn’t quite up to facing the “T & N” door, or more specifically, the “T” behind it, and rapped smartly on the opposite door.

 

 

“Good morning, boys.” he said, opening the door. Dr. Davison made it sound like more of a command than a greeting. There was little space in the room for anything other than a somewhat battered dresser and two single beds on either end, each containing a teenage boy. One was seventeen, one was fifteen, and neither was awake. Dr. Davison cleared his throat loudly.

“I said, ‘good morning, boys’.” he repeated. The ginger rolled over and sort of pawed at the air desperately, whereas the younger did not move. Like most fifteen year old boys, Adric had no interest whatsoever in being woken up at precisely seven o clock every morning.

 

Turlough sat up and tried his best to look awake despite the fact his eyes refused to open. Being awake at the same time as his guardian was part of a cunning survival plan on Turlough’s part. The lump in the bed opposite him did not move in the least, although a single bare leg poked out of the mess of blankets. Dr. Davison sighed in exasperation.

“Tell me he didn’t fall asleep in his clothes again.”

“He didi fug ganan.” mumbled Turlough, rubbing his eyes. One of them opened, and he formed an actual word. “What?”

 

“Adric, wake up.” said the boy’s guardian, loudly and clearly. The lump of blankets which was Adric condensed slightly. 

“You’re only going to regret it, not waking up sooner and losing your spot in line for the bathroom…”

Dr. Davison swept the coverlet off of Adric’s bed, but the only effect this created was the teenager balling his body around a pillow.

 

“…I’m really quite busy…” Dr. Davison continued, grabbing the edge Adric’s featherbed. “…and I don’t have time…”

The young doctor pulled on the feather bed, and it slid off of the bed frame and onto the floor. The boy sleeping on the bed slid with it and landed on the floor with a thump.

“...to do this!” Dr. Davison exclaimed, standing over his ward. Adric grumbled and curled into a smaller ball. Exasperation flowing out of every feature on his face, the young doctor bent over the lad.

“Get! Up!” he shouted. Adric made a strange burbling noise and covered his head. Dr. Davison fumed slightly at this state of affairs, largely because it had been the the usual morning ritual for the past several months.

“ _I’m_ awake, doctor.” Turlough pointed out obsequiously. 

“Good, sit on Adric.” Dr. Davison grumbled, sulking out of the room. He had intended to say, “Yes, Turlough, I can see that, Turlough, very good Turlough.” but the words just didn’t want to leave his mouth.

 

As soon as he was quite sure his guardian was not going to turn back again, Adric flicked a V to his retreating back.

“You’re lucky he didn’t see that.” said Turlough, climbing out of bed. Adric’s face, bearing a rather cross expression, finally rose from his pillow with his hair jutting out at odd angles that made his head look twice the usual size. 

“And I suppose you’d tell him, wouldn’t you?” Adric grumbled.

“I might.” Turlough answered dryly. 

 

 

 

 

Elsewhere in the city, another man was making a wake-up call of a different sort. Dr. Pertwee, a colleague of Dr. Davison, had recently woken and was only slightly more happy about it than Adric. Then again, usually when Dr. Pertwee was happy about something, that something was getting axel grease on his sleeve protectors. He was still wearing his silk pyjamas, a quilted satin dressing gown, and a flat sleeping cap, shaped rather like a fez.

 

“… _bum bum bum bada bum bum bum…_ ” he hummed merrily to himself, whisking his shaving soap into a froth. Carefully he applied this mixture to his face, stretching it expressively to cover his stubble _exactly_ but leave his sideburns where they were. His eyebrows sunk and raised with the music, his face all but dancing. 

“… _ba da dum ba daaa…_ ” he held the note for the entirety of his first careful stroke with the straight razor, shook the froth into his shaving bowl, and twisted his face up for the next stroke. He continued along his face in much the same manner, distracted from the final stroke under his chin by the ringing of a bell just outside his washroom.

 

“Who the devil would be calling at this hour?” he wondered aloud, glancing briefly over his shoulder. He focused on his reflection for a moment more, allowing the telephone to ring again while he finished his task. Anyone who would call at precisely seven o clock in the morning didn’t deserve to be picked up on the first ring.

Patting his face with a warm towel, Dr. Pertwee exited his washroom and lifted the receiver. 

 

“Transcendental Academy Faculty Housing, apartment oh-oh-three.” he answered curtly.

“Good morning, Dr. Pertwee.” purred a warm, velvety voice on the other end of the line. “This is your seven o clock wake up call.”

“I never requested a seven o clock wake up call, Master Delgado, and even if I had there are many I would ask for this service long before you.”

“You wound me.” answered the voice of Delgado. “Why ever could that be, I wonder?”

“Oh, for many reasons. Firstly, I would have thought this beneath your dignity, and of course the last time we parted, you looked quite deceased.”

“I am feeling infinitely better today, thank you.”

“Do feel free to inform me should that situation change.” Dr. Pertwee replied irritably, “But be sure to do so after the hour of nine.” 

With that, the old fop slapped the receiver back onto the hook and stormed back into the washroom.

 

 

 

It was a wonderful, sunny day and the air smelt of hope. The man was surrounded by soft, friendly kittens the size of labradors who nuzzled him and drank from the saucers of milk he was pouring. The only sour spot in the world was an annoying bird was chirp over his shoulder. He could have stood the squawking, but it had begun chanting his surname.

“Benton. Benton. Benton. Wake up, Benton.”

Sergeant John Benton was suddenly and rudely returned to the world of the awake. The kittens disappeared and the bird was replaced by his best friend and direct superior, who he did not expect to find inches from his face. For a moment, the sergeant just looked mortified and hoped the captain would speak. 

 

“Is it seven already, sir?” Benton asked tentatively.

“Yes, it is.” said Ct. Yates. He wasn’t in uniform himself, and judging by the look of him he had made waking up Benton his first priority that morning. He stepped back from the bed to allow the other man to get up. There wasn’t a lot of room in sergeant Benton’s quarters, but he was fortunate to be high-up enough not to share them. And, if he had any way of knowing he would have been somewhat gratified to note he had about as much room to himself as one of Dr. Davison’s wards. Yawning, Benton grabbed on of his bedposts and hauled himself off his mattress.

 

“Respectfully, sir,” Benton commented, “I don’t believe all sergeants get personal wake up calls from their captain at seven in the morning.”

“That’s true. But not all sergeants make my coffee.”

 

 

 

Just after seven, Dr. McGann had finished dressing, more or less, and eaten some toast and tea. He had every intention of stopping at a small café which had sprung up at the edge of the campus with the intention of catering to the students. He was quite fond of the place, the prices were reasonable and they had a very nice assam blend particular to their menu. It was an excellent place to grab a spot of breakfast on the way to class, even if some of the students would stare uncomfortably at him and wonder what a professor was doing out of a classroom.

He still had plenty of time for such an indulgence, after all. Even though he really did intend to have an early start. For some dreadfully important reason he would doubtless remember when it came up. He strode confidently out of his apartments and bounced down the stairs. He continued bouncing along confidently until he reached the end of the drive of the professor’s dormitory, when he remembered that his pocket-watch was still sitting on his bedside table. With a great flare of green velvet and brown curls, Dr. McGann spun about on his heel and tore back into the dormitory.

 

 

 

With the slow, deliberate movements of continental shift, Adric had made it out of bed and very nearly all the way to the washroom by three after seven. It wasn’t until he reached for the doorknob did he notice that another person was also reaching for it. He started, pulled his eyes up to a reasonable level, and looked at the girl as if he had never seen one before. Despite the fact he had seen that very girl last night at supper and made a point of saying goodnight a good deal later than her roommate liked.

Nyssa wasn’t sure how she had managed to not notice Adric was coming down the hall directly in front of her, though the book she was carrying just might be at fault. She closed it sheepishly.

“Oh, are you-” she began.

“No, that’s alright.” he blurted, “Ladies first, after all.” Part of Adric’s mind groaned internally at this, but the part of his mind that was extremely gratified at Nyssa’s smile was just as loud.

“Thank you, Adric. I don’t think I’ll be long.” she nodded. The petulant groaning voice in Adric’s head stated its doubts on this subject, but it was quickly silenced by _Of course she doesn’t realise how long she takes in the bath, she’s a girl. They always do take ages and ages, and never realise how unnecessary it all is._

The fifteen year old boy took his place in line for the bathroom, congratulating himself on his excellent understanding of the female psyche.

 

 

 

 

Around seven or so, at least by the nearest clock, Mrs. Baker lifted her head from her husband's chest and made a funny grumbling noise. Sometime between their falling asleep and waking up, a number of cats had crept into their bedroom and settled on their sleeping forms. She attempted to roll up on her elbow, but found there was no particularly good place to brace herself between the small, furry cats and the large, loud cat to whom she was married. 

Dr. Baker did not so much wake himself so much as do his best to remain in the same position he had been before his wife had moved, but found that he was unable to keep his position unless his arms were around her waist. His grip tightened and she found herself returning to roughly the same position she had spent the night in.

Without any particular hardship on her part, she resigned herself to a few more minutes dozing in their rather soft, warm bed; wedged between some wonderfully furry cats and her cuddly husband. And really, Peri was feeling terribly dubious about the entire consciousness thing herself.

 

 

 

Elsewhere in that very house, the elder Baker brother’s eyes flicked open like a piece of clockwork. They were slate gray, perfectly round, and slightly unnerving. Most people have the decency to look somewhat groggy first thing in the morning; but as he would gladly tell anyone who would listen, Dr. Thomas Baker was not remotely related to most people. A large, amputee deerhound had started the night sleeping on his feet, but over the course of the night the dog crept under his blankets, snuggled beside its master, and now was very nearly pushing him out of bed. He scratched the animal’s ears affectionately.

 

“Good morning, Kanis Lupis.” the deep, rumbling voice of Dr. Baker purred. The dog nuzzled his face and licked it far more thoroughly than anyone who was not very fond of the dog in question would have allowed. The man patted the dog’s flank and the animal stopped presently, once it was quite sure his face was clean, and hopped awkwardly off the bed, sitting down immediately to keep from falling on it’s face. Life could be difficult for a large deerhound missing its front left leg and hind right, left eye and much of the surrounding face, but at the moment, Kanis Lupis looked quite happy. What was left of his tail drummed excitedly on the floor. Dr. Baker grinned his half-moon smile and climbed out of bed.

 

“Just a minute, let’s get you dressed, shall we?” he purred, crossing to a set of drawers and opening it. Set in velvet-lined cases fitted specially for the various pieces, a selection of apparati in brass and leather gleamed in the morning light. The doctor lifted an intricate piece of machinery that didn’t properly resemble a dog’s hind leg without the reference of the amputee hound.

The dog gave a yap of approval.

 

Dr. Baker sank to his knees and Kanis Lupis twitched in place as if he were expecting a treat. He carefully set the artificial limb against the dog’s pelvis and strapped it into place. Piece by piece, the drawer was emptied and the dog was assembled. Two limbs, a half mask, and little boots to save the fleshy paws from being torn apart with the speed the mechanical limbs Finally, an intricate collar with stripes of brown and gold and copper in uneven patterns and a piece of clockwork as large as a goose egg was set against the animal’s throat.

“Good boy, Lupis. Good boy. Speak!”

“ _Mäs-tir!_ ” the mechanical voice box croaked like a tiny part of bellows.

“Good boy!” he crowed. He ruffled the animal’s fur and pulled himself up to his full height. The dog bounced in an aborted attempt to jump up on his master’s legs. Dr. Baker smiled and opened his chamber door, and Kanis Lupis obediently loped out into the main house.

“Now go and bother my brother’s cats, there’s a good boy.”

 

 

 

 

Just after several cats ran up curtains, two human figures made a very similar trek up a rope ladder. Charley looked up at just the wrong moment, and Jack’s coat hit her in the face. 

“ _Ouf!_ ” Charley exclaimed, gripping onto the ladder harder.

“I understand wanting to get the most of the view, but don’t follow too close!” Jack laughed.

“I said I’ve been on airships before, Captain!” Charley defended, remembering her accent halfway though. “I not going to get distracted by the clouds and fall off the side, you can’ be sure of that.”

“I’ll try not to be hurt by that.” he muttered, hauling himself up to the level of the deck. A delicate hand in a brown glove took the captain’s and pulled him the rest of the way up.

 

“Do you have _any_ idea how late it is?” came a woman’s voice above Charley’s head.

“I suppose you do, then?”

“Seven sixteen exactly, captain.” answered a man. Already slightly befuddled, Charley hurried to add a visual component to what she couldn’t possibly be hearing. The same gloved hand reached down again, and when she took it, Charley fund herself face-to-face with the ship’s doctor, who was not at all what she expected.

“There’s women on this ship?” Charley asked, so surprised that the accent she’d been keeping up all night dropped entirely.

“Don’t tell anyone.” Martha smiled. “They only just figured out that I’m black.”

 

The doctor helped the deckhand onto the slightly-swaying deck of the airship, and the faint hum of engines purred up through their boots. Charley looked around in slight awe of everything around her, not least to say Martha. Further on, the men were making their own fun at the other’s expense in the practiced way of old friends.

 

“Captain on deck.” 

“You know I don’t stand on that kind of protocol, Mickey.”

“Of course not, that was more of a warning.”

“Although now that you mention it, I might want to start…”

“I can just see you setting up a captain's table and inviting your favourite people in to have dinner with you?”

“I just might do that!” Jack laughed. “Put it right in the middle of the engine room, just where you’re working. You wouldn’t mind, would you?”

“You could always put it on your bed, it’s seen most of the crew.”

“Don’t be bitter because your wife wants you to be monogamous now.”

 

Charley wasn’t sure whether to be amused or mortified. Martha petted her arm half to comfort her and half to get her attention.

“Never mind them, they’re great friends. Jack just needs to flirt every five minutes or he combusts. You get used to it. Let me show you a bunk.”

 

 

 

 

In a time when a regular cause of train delays was the wrong type of young lady tied to the railroad tracks, (though it was never made clear what sort of young lady wouldn’t cause delay by being tied up) certain people found it prudent to precautions against any such inconvenience  that might effect themselves of the young women in their lives. Such as an escort.

Ct. Taylor would have preferred another piloting job, but the licensing board had recently changed the two-year period after crashing and being marooned before you could renew your license from date of crash to date of rescue. As such, his current employment was no longer transporting excitable scientists to far off islands in hope of discovering new species and now escorting one sixteen-year old girl to finishing school. 

It could have been worse, of course, his charge was friendly and cheerful, if a little pushy sometimes and entirely too young to be riding behind him on his motorised velocipede if her parents _hadn’t_ been paying him for her protection. But they were, and other than that hand on his waist was entirely to keep her balance and as long as she didn’t fall off, Ct. Taylor didn’t need to worry about his charge.

If only she hadn’t kept engaging him in conversation.

 

“I am trying to keep my eyes on the road, Dorothy.”

“I told you, it’s Dodo to my friends!” the girl insisted. She did her best to look at his face given she was sitting behind him, leaning to one side almost enough to unbalance the velocipede. “And we are friends, aren’t we?”

“I suppose. It would explain why I put up with your smart mouth sometimes.”

“Then why won’t you tell me where you go while I’m at school?”

“I did. I told you, I go and get a coffee, read the newspaper, and come back to pick you up.”

“That can’t be all you do. School’s hours and hours long.”

“It just feels that way because you aren’t interested in the proper etiquette at a tea dance?”

“Well, have _you_ ever needed to know the proper etiquette at a tea dance?”

“No.” Stephen admitted. “But don’t think I’ve lived a normal girl’s life.” Dodo laughed aloud at that, and Stephen wasn’t quite sure if she was aware if she was hugging him tighter when she laughed, or pressing her face into his shoulder. He decided not to tell her, because that sounded too much like asking her to stop, and if he asked her too stop, he would have to decide whether or not he liked it when she did that. It was easier to just focus on the traffic.

He pulled them to a stop at the tram crossing. Slowly, the cars pulled past them, up and onto the railing along the buildings, passing between the ground traffic and the sky traffic of the city’s morning commute.

 

 

“Have you got a spare tram token, dearie? Help an old lady home?” called a voice from the sidewalk. Both the operator and passenger of the velocipede turned their heads with the confused expression of someone who isn’t quite sure if a stranger just started talking to them. In Stephen’s case, this expression was static, but innocent curiosity quickly overtook the girl. Dodo pulled her driving goggles up onto her forehead to get a better look at Iris.

 

“I’m sorry, I don’t take the tram.” Dodo explained. She craned to look at Stephen. “Do you have a token?”

“No!” he said quickly. “I drive, anyone can see that.”

“You’ve got one, don’t you?” Dodo asked suspiciously. He glanced over his shoulder, and was greeted with an extremely skeptical teenager inches from his nose. He spoke to her in a low, aggravated tone that nonetheless carried to Iris.

“If I can smell the alcohol on her breath over the petrol, then we can be pretty sure that she’s going to spend anything she gets on more of it.”

“How could she spend a tram token on alcohol?” Dodo reasoned. Stephen blustered for a moment, then turned his eyes back to the road.

“The tram’s passed. We’d better get you to school.” The engine revved like someone nervously clearing their throat and the velocipede sped away from the intersection and the drunk woman. Dodo looked as far over her shoulder as she was able, even going so far as to take her hand off of Stephen’s waist to wave.

“I’m sorry, ma’am! Good luck!”

 

 

 

 

Some of the professors felt they had drawn rather a short straw in housing. In some cases, such as Dr. Pertwee’s tinkering covering most every surface in his home, or Dr. Davison, not having enough room for all of his wards to run about without knocking into each other; wanted more room for living. In the case of Dr. Troughton, however, he wanted more room for his hats.

 

There were three little bedrooms that in a large house like the Baker residence might have been boot-rooms or servant’s attics, all directly below Dr. Davison’s rooms so often they were woken by the clattering of many feet or an argument and thanked themselves for relative domestic bliss. To be fair, Dr. Troughton’s bodyguard did once offer to go upstairs with his musket and see what the teenagers were screaming about, but the consensus of the apartment was that if teenagers were screaming, then a scotsman with a gun nearly as big as he was wouldn’t do much to calm them down. It had gone so far that any time the neighbours raised a significant ruckus someone  would say “No, Jamie.” whether or not Jamie had offered or even thought about sorting it out himself. When it came down to it, Jamie found that Dr. Troughton’s niece, when she stayed over, thought of siccing Jamie on the children more often than Jamie did himself. 

 

Dr. Troughton was in the largest bedroom, because after all, it _was_ his home and anyone who wanted to was welcome to join him if they wanted to, the heating in the faculty housing wasn’t what it used to be after Dr. Hurndul “fixed it” so that it could “more efficiently heat and be used as a power source”. Dr. Hurndul no longer worked at the university for this reason, among others. Many teachers thought it was best never to speak of him.

Dr. Troughton had gotten out of bed, because after all, it was twenty after seven and he didn’t want to spend all day laying there staring at his ceiling, and had even gotten so far as to get dressed, such as he ever did dress. He’d received a good number of Dr. Hartnell’s cast-off clothing, and considered himself quite the frugal buyer in doing so. However, Dr. Hartnell was significantly taller than Dr. Troughton and tended not to throw things away if they could conceivably be repaired. Had they not been happily adopted by Dr. Troughton, these clothes would have been given to the ragman. 

But there was one aspect of his appearance of which Dr. Troughton was very particular. One wall of his bedroom was completely dominated by hats. Hat-stands covered the wall like a thicket, or a forest bearing strange fruits. An oval mirror in a stand, which had a bowler balanced on the edge at the moment. Dr. Troughton touched his lower lip thoughtfully, eyes resting on first a crooked stovepipe hat with brass goggles around the rim, and then a slightly less rumpled stovepipe hat with _copper_ goggles around the rim. Then of course there was the black bowler, but he wore that yesterday.  And the brown bowler didn’t match his rumpled suit; it was better worn with the brown checked trousers, not the blue. He could of course change his trousers… His reverie was broken by a knock at the door.

 

A lovely young woman stepped just inside the door. Her dress was fashionable and neatly pressed, and her blonde hair had been twisted up into a large, elegant bun, but without her usual amount of accessories and makeup she looked half-dressed.

“You will remember to eat something before work, won’t you, uncle Pat?” 

“Of course, Polly!” he said quickly. “I’ll be in for breakfast in just a minute, my dear. All I need is to pick out a hat.” The young woman laughed and shook her head.

“That usually takes a lot more than a minute! Can’t you do that after breakfast? You don’t want to forget to eat again.”

“No, no, of course not.” he agreed.

 

For reasons of his own, perhaps waiting the bear in on this conversation, perhaps craving every person in the apartment being in the same room at once, Jamie followed Polly into Dr. Troughton’s bedroom. It is said that friends have their own personal language for each other, and the closer they were, the further it was from their mother tongue.

“Aren’t ye kitted out _yet?_ ” he demanded, which served as ‘good morning’.

“I’ve got my trousers on, which is more than you can say!” Dr. Troughton huffed indignantly. “All I need is a hat, and I’ll be in with you for breakfast in just a minute. You haven’t eaten yet, have you?”

“We’ve had time to.” Jamie grumbled.

“Not just yet, we had rather been expecting you.” Polly explained.

“Well, go and start, I’ll be in the kitchen before the eggs are boiled.”

“Alright, uncle Pat.” Polly agreed, leaving the room. “Just don’t be too late or yours will get cold.”

“Of course, my dear. I’ll be right with you.” Dr. Troughton hurriedly agreed, turning his focus back not his hats. The two young persons turned about and, given the side of the apartment, found themselves in the kitchen.

“Y’ken,” said Jamie significantly, looking directly at Polly. “If we’re gon get out in time for classes, somebody ought to get a start on breakfast.”

“You’re right, Jamie.” said Polly. “Put the kettle on.”

 

 

 

 

At seven twenty-three, Nyssa exited the bathroom in Dr. Davison’s quarters. Adric lumbered up to his bare feet, rapidly gathering the bundle of fabric that, judging by the awful mustard colour, was probably his school uniform. Nyssa was much more fortunate in that regard, her finishing school’s uniform was a far more flattering maroon and didn’t look like it was intended to be worn by someone five years her junior. Despite this, she was far more likely to remember to change out of her uniform when she got home than Adric was.

 

“When did you get your uniform?” she asked. “I would have though you’d lose your place if you left for a second.”

“I can outrun Turlough.” he said confidently. A mischievous grin tugged at the corner of his mouth. “Especially if he’s too busy with that diary of his to notice I went back for my clothes.” Adric laughed, but Nyssa only smiled.

With a breeze of wisteria-scented soap and a rustle of petticoat, Nyssa retreated back towards her bedroom. Just after she passed him, she glanced over her shoulder.

“Thanks again, Adric.”

“Yes.” he replied quickly, though he wasn’t sure exactly what he meant by that. Nyssa wasn’t either, so she just smiled back and left to gather her things for school.

 

He stared with a somewhat foolish grin at Nyssa’s curls as they bounced down the hall. Adric stared for so long he almost missed Tegan walking past him and into the lavatory.

“Hang on a minute, it’s my turn!” Adric protested.

“I thought you said ‘ladies first’.” Tegan murmured, with an edge to her voice.

“To Nyssa.” Adric retorted. “I’m not sure you’re a lady.”

Tegan narrowed her eyes and shoved her adoptive brother out from between her and the bathroom. Adric’s shoulder hit the wall, not hard enough to bruise, but hard enough for him to rub as he stared sulkily at Tegan entering the restroom.

 

 

 

 

 

“Is the military sense of it, you understand?”

“Not. A .Word. Mate.”

“Come man, it’s obvious!” Osgood exclaimed excitedly.  “The military applications of this technology could revolutionise warfare.”

“And a revolutionised warfare will do us poor sots in the actual war a fat load of good!” Ben retorted. “I’ve been working on proper, waterborne ships all me life and now I’ve got to figure out the ropes on an airborne vessel or lose my place on deck.”

“There aren’t any ropes on an airborne vessel.” Osgood answered. “Not the new N-9s, haven’t been any ropes since the N-7s.”

“That’s just my problem!” Ben exclaimed, slapping the table with his hand. The canteen buzzed softly as men filed in and partook in the fine military tradition of talking with their mouths full.

 

Two men approached the table with full coffee mugs. Osgood nodded at them, then looked again and shot up like his seat was on fire. 

“If he’s not too important to nosh with us, he ain’t important enough to stand to attention for up for.” Ben said casually, dunking the end of his toast in his coffee.

“I’ll keep that in mind, shipman… Jackson, wasn’t it?” said Ct. Yates with the air of a cat standing directly behind a mouse. Ben Jackson slowly looked up at a caption who wasn’t in his division of the military but was looking somewhere between amused and smug. Part of him wanted to get back at Yates, and part of him wanted to retreat in terror. He settled for standing long enough for the captain to sit down. Benton, who had been standing behind him, followed suit.

 

Once everyone was once again seated and eating, Ben surreptitiously looked from Yates to Osgood. 

“You got the time, Captain?” he asked. Osgood’s eyes flashed open. He could smell a bad decision on the boil and he desperately hoped that Jackson could read the words “don’t do it”, which Osgood could feel being projected onto his glasses like a zoopraxiscope projects onto walls. Ben either missed this very clear image or chose to ignore it, as his hands slowly shifted from his old cold coffee toward the middle of the table as Ct. Yates reached into his pocket.

 

“Seven twenty-six.” the captain read off the watch. He reached down and picked up Ben’s coffee, which was now in the place his own had been. He sipped it idly, then looked mildly confused and glanced at Benton.  Benton eagerly buttered his own toast for a good ten seconds before noticing that all three men were looking at him.

“Something wrong, sir?” he asked carefully. Yates looked Benton dead in the eyes, placed the coffee that started in front of Jackson in front of Benton and took Benton’s coffee. Osgood took his own cup in both hands and drank as quickly as he could manage. He wouldn’t say a word about what was happening, but if he didn’t hurry with his own breakfast, he might get involved.

 

 

 

 

At precisely seven-thirty, one of the various bells connected to the internal telephone system in the Baker residence kitchen started to ring. Mrs. Smythe was beating what would soon become a cheese soufflé and had no intention of answering it. Her eyes flashed to Phipilla, then to the handset, indicating that the kitchen maid would be best to stop juicing fruit and answer the call. The kitchen maid muttered a tired, “Yes, Mrs. Smythe.” and wiped her hands on the front of her apron as she crossed to the speaker. She checked the bells just before she picked up, even though she already knew that the call that came at precisely seven-thirty was going to be coming from the night nursery. Therefore, she knew that when she picked up the receiver, a voice like sugar syrup on the other end, apologising for bothering her but wanting half a grapefruit, a glass of orange juice, warm milk, one large bowl of porridge and one smaller bowl of porridge, and dry wheat toast brought to the dining room. And that, of course, the adult members of The Family would be up and about soon, and doubtless they wanted three times the same.

 

 

“Good morning, miss Jackson. I’m sorry to bother you, but could you have breakfast sent up to the day nursery?”

“Of course, miss Bush.”

“Thank you ever so much. We would like half a grapefruit, a glass of orange juice, warm milk, one large bowl of porridge and one smaller bowl of porridge, and dry wheat toast.”

“And kippers on toast.” added a slightly-muffled voice with an American accent. Both the nanny and the kitchen maid ignored this, as neither infants nor penguins spoke.

 

“Dr. Baker, Dr. Baker, and Mrs. Baker will want three more of the same.” miss Bush finished. Phipilla didn’t argue, even though she knew that the Bakers wanted cake, scrambled eggs, sausage, and strawberry crepes (or something equally as distant from grapefruit and porridge), and knew that miss Bush knew it too. She even suspected that Miss Bush knew that the Bakers wouldn’t be eating what she ordered, and even if they did it probably wouldn’t be for at least another hour.

“Of course, Miss Bush. It will be up shortly.” Phipilla answered. As polite as her words were, her tone suggested that the nanny should seek mental care for being so damn cheery first thing in the morning.

“Thank you ever so much, miss Jackson! Have an excellent morning!”

“Good morning, miss Bush.” she replied, and hung the receiver.

“The usual?” Mrs. Smythe asked from the stove.

“Well, it’s not a vegetable omelet.” said Phipilla. She sat back down at the scrubbed wooden table and went back to cutting the strawberries for the Bakers’ crepes.

 

 

 

 

Very suddenly, like a small explosion, the door to Dr. Hartnell’s bedroom was flung open and a fifteen year old girl in a blue nightdress bounded inside.

“Grandfather, wake up! It’s past seven-thirty!” Susan flashed across the room with a similar energy, threw open the curtains, pushed the pane up and flung open the shutters like a cuckoo in a clock. In the bed, an old man with long white hair and an even longer sleeping cap groaned to life like a badly oiled machine.

“Good gracious child, do you have any idea what time it is?” he sputtered, eyes not yet open.

“Yes, grandfather! I just said.” Susan replied, pulling her head inside the window. She smiled at the old man fondly and sat on the foot of his bed.

“Hm? Yes, so you did, so you did.” he muttered, finally forcing one eye open. 

“Would you like to hear about the dream I had last night, grandfather?”

“Oh? So you finally did get to sleep sometime last night? That gramophone was still cranking away when I went to bed.”

“Well, I wanted to listen to it once more before I returned the record to Vicki. She has such a splendid collection of records, grandfather. And she even saw the Common-men’s Band playing when they were last in London-”

“And before you ask yet again, if they come on a night my legs are willing to carry me that far, we _shall_ go. But they weren’t last month.”

“Don’t you want to hear about my dream?”

“Hm? Yes, yes, child. Of course I do.”

“It was so _odd,_ grandfather! We were in space, and we’d taken two of teachers along with us-”

“I _do_ want to hear, but tell me at breakfast.”

“Alright.” She leaned forward and kissed her grandfather’s forehead. He chuckled, then shifted the blankets off of his legs.

“Now run along, Susan.” he instructed. “Let your grandfather dress, and I’ll fix us up some breakfast.”

 

 

 

 

Dr. McCoy was quite aware that his clock was twenty-five minutes fast because he’d set it like that himself. So, then it told him it was eight a clock he knew this was nonsense, and that he had plenty of time to dress and get to work. Dr. McCoy was yet another professor at the local academy, but no one knew for certain in which department. Everyone knew that he taught a Philosophy class, but he also taught a Chemistry class and a Modern Literature class and he had taught on a number of other classes on other subjects and could not be relied on to attend any department meetings. More worryingly, he couldn’t be counted to _miss_ any department meetings and often appeared at various meetings and paid rapt attention to whoever was speaking but not saying a word unless he was addressed.

 

Deftly, he knotted a silk cravat with a brilliant red-and blue floral pattern around the collar of his shirt. His mind was elsewhere, but it usually was. Where that elsewhere was, he made of point of making sure no one could say. It took a lot of work to be mysterious all the time, even when all you actually wanted to do was have a nice cup of tea and read for a bit; but he had cultivated the art over the past few years and managed quite well. Not that he’d say so himself, part of being intentionally mysterious was that you never told anyone _what_ you were either doing or thinking, at least not truthfully; and if he actually said “I’m being mysterious” that would come far too close to explaining what exactly he was doing and he couldn’t have that. At that really mattered was that his eyes looked sufficiently unattached to the act of dressing, and the clothes itself reflected the fact that the person wearing them wasn’t paying attention to them. He had carefully picked them out to look like he wasn’t paying attention to his clothing, but just close enough to normal fashion that most people wouldn’t feel the need to comment. 

 

He mainly wore brown and tan suits with brightly coloured ties. And a collection of various waistcoats, all sufficiently eccentric to make him easily recognisable as a batty old professor without being strange enough to make anyone ask what he was doing dressed like that. Today’s selection was a very autumnal checkered suit and a knitted waistcoat with a pattern of maple leaves and copper buttons down the front. He brushed off his hat, set it in front of the mirror, and took the final touch out of the top drawer of his dresser. Like the rest of his room, it was organised to the point of actually looking like a mess. A neat, orderly stack of crisply pressed, monogrammed handkerchiefs wedged in the middle of the drawer. Pocket-watches, driving goggles, hip flasks, and other small personal effects filled the rest of the drawer so completely and carefully that if you were to remove any one of them, you could tell what was missing by the shape of the hole. Again, one was forced to remind themselves it was actually very organised, but the organisation was so full and complex that Dr. McCoy was the only person in the world who could make any sense of it. 

 

Dr. McCoy picked up one of the handkerchiefs significantly, fluted it, and placed it in his front pocket such that the bright red question mark embroidered in one corner was just visible. There were only thirteen men in the world who _ever_ owned handkerchiefs such as these, and now there were only twelve. All of them taught at the same school, and he was probably going to see most of them over the course of the day, even though there wasn’t a meeting tonight.

 

But none of that was consequential at the moment. His young apprentice should be waking up any minute now. As soon as he was dressed, he ought to fix breakfast for the both of them. If they wanted to eat together, he would have to hurry, as she had a meeting of her own half after nine, and he wanted to give her plenty of time to make off without him knowing that she was meeting someone. He suspected it was very good for her to think she had secrets, and she almost certainly had figured out that he figured out she was a girl, even if he wasn’t certain to the day when she realised that he knew. The bothered him more than he cared to admit, and he had a mental note to figure it out if he ever got the chance.

 

 

 

 

 

When seven forty actually came, Adric was still in his striped pyjamas and a bit cross about it. The household had gotten much louder as more people moved around, Nyssa finishing dressing her hair in front of the mirror on the back of the girls’ door, Tegan singing to herself in a tone she thought no one could hear as she bathed, Adric shouting through the door “aren’t you done yet?”, Turlough knocking something over in the boys’ room and locking Adric out while he put it to right, and from the kitchen occasional shouts from Dr. Davison for all of them to quiet down. 

 

Adric had taken the opportunity to nip into the kitchen for a pre-breakfast snack in order to avoid listening to Tegan sing to herself, which was slightly annoying, while she bathed, which was slightly creepy. Of course, most of the time that he had intended to spend nipping into the kitchen, grabbing an apple, and leaving had been taken up by Dr. Davison seeing him and asking for a hand getting breakfast on the table, and why are you snacking before breakfast you shouldn’t snack between meals and you ought to set the table for breakfast because it should be ready soon, why are you still in your pyjamas, you’re going to be late for school at this rate and I can’t drop you off if you don’t go off when Turlough does because I’ve got to get to work myself, you did get all of your schoolwork done last night because I heard you listening to that comedy record and surely you know that isn’t a proper logic progression at all, and are you raising your voice to _me_ young man I can raise my voice much higher and much shriller.

 

When Adric returned, fuming, to the hall where he had been waiting, he discovered that his place in line had been taken by Turlough. This was about all the lad could take.

“What do you think you’re doing‽” Adric demanded. Slowly, _languidly_ even, Turlough turned his head to look at Adric. Turlough was very practiced at looking languidly at people and it annoyed Adric to no end. It was just an air that seventeen-year-old boys liked to project to let fifteen-year-old-boys know that those were the two most significant years of life and somehow, the older boys had learned everything there was to learn and no longer cared about it. 

 

“What does it look like?” Turlough asked coolly.

“It looks like you’ve taken my spot in line for the bath!” Adric spat.

“No, I haven’t. I’m in _my_ spot for the bath.”

“I’ve been waiting here all morning!” Adric snapped. “All I want is to use the toilet!”

“Well, you haven’t been here all morning, because you weren’t here when I came here, and that means that I’m first in line for the bath and you’re after me.” Turlough answered matter-of-factly. 

 

“Of course, we could always come to a comprise about the matter…” Turlough suggested, examining his fingernails.

“What do you want?” Adric grumbled.

“Oh, just a little more time in the evenings for my personal reading and a slightly higher grade in mathematics.” Turlough looked up from his hand to enjoy his adoptive brother’s excellent impression of a kettle boiling over.

“ _I’ve told you I’m not doing your Maths coursework! You’re three years above me and if you’re too thick to figure it out yourself-_ ”

“I think I fancy a nice, _long_ , hot bath this morning… in fact I doubt if they’ll be any hot water left at all…”

“ _Turlough, you absolute_ -” Adric clenched his hands and searched his vocabulary for something as bad as Turlough was. Before anything better than “rotter”, “slime-mould”, and “penile prosthetic” came to mind, the shouting was interrupted by a shout from the kitchen.

 

“Boys, you won’t like it if I have to stop this row myself!” called Dr. Davison over the sound of sizzling sausages.

“But he-” Adric protested. The door to the bathroom opened, and a somewhat damp conductorette stepped between the two of them. She didn’t look impressed with either one.

“Tegan!” Adric pleaded. “Tell Turlough that I was here first! I was here before you got in, and you cut in line ahead of me.”

“Sort it out yourself.” Tegan shrugged. “I’ve got to get ready for work.”

“Why do you all hate me?” Adric exploded dramatically. Turlough took this as permission to take his bath and leave Adric to simmer in his martyrdom. But he did lock the door in case Adric didn’t really mean that. Which he probably didn’t.

 

 

 

 

 

Two apartments down,  an older man noticed the drain on the hot water pressure and gave up on spending any more time surrounded by hot clouds of steam. This didn’t end the stream of music he was humming to himself, the hero’s theme from an opera he’d only last week had ruined by the couple in the next booth over having a huge argument and leaving in the middle of. Dr. Pertwee shut off the taps reluctantly, made a quiet comment to himself about keeping young people in the student housing where they belonged, and pulled open the curtain of his shower. He emerged from the steam like a sea monster emerges from the depths of murky sea; only much more toned and triangular. Dr. Pertwee was remarkably fit for anyone of any age, much less an old man with a teaching career. Of course, he did coach the school’s boxing team, but rather than many coaches of his age, there was no doubt at all that he could thrash any student he chose to. Perhaps that was related to slacking enrolment in the boxing team, but those that did stay found that when Dr. Pertwee was not telling them to use their common sense and open their eyes and not be so damn thick for a single moment; he was a very thorough and knowledgable teacher. That might have been at least partially because the students were far more attentive than they were during any of his chemistry lectures, but he took full credit for that as well.

 

He replaced the towel with the quilted dressing gown he entered the washroom wearing. Still humming, Dr. Pertwee left the washroom and puttered his way back to his bedroom. On one side of his bed, the silk pyjamas he had slept in were somewhat carelessly thrown over the edge. Opposite them, like two men with entirely different sleeping styles sharing a bed, the clothing he intended to wear that day lay in a neat, crisply folded stack. It was true that he was a bit of a dandy, but taking a salary from both the school and the government, he felt quite comfortable clothing himself in only the best-fitted velvet jackets and ruffliest of shirts. Seeing the two sets of clothing in one bed, so sharply in contrast, reminded him that he hadn’t seen the other occupant of his apartments since late the previous night. The fop made a note to check on him once he was dressed. 

 

Carefully and precisely, the garments were unfolded, settled into place, fastened, and brushed lightly to remove any particles of dust that might have settled on the velvet since the clothes were laid out. He checked the mirror above the dresser one last time, ran a hand through the full silver curls to fluff them to their full size, then teased a single curl onto his forehead. He nodded at his reflection, frowned slightly, and doused himself with a vial of lavender water. He had learned to be quite liberal to cover the scent of motor oil that would doubtless cling to him by the end of the day. 

 

Finally satisfied with his appearance, he exited his bedroom and crossed the rooms to the only other bedroom in apartment 003. He rapped sharply on the door with his knuckles.

“Alistair? Get up, man. It’s quarter to eight.”

 

 

 

 

 

In theory, the whole Baker household, even the nanny and her young change, ate breakfast together every morning at seven-thirty. In reality, Miss Bush and Frobisher had been sitting alone in the very bright, sunny dining room for the last twenty minutes watching the porridge cool. While the two had been waiting, several cats had strolled through the room, begged a saucer of milk off the kind-hearted nanny, and gone about their business elsewhere in the house. Five minutes earlier, there had been a great ruckus of hissing of both felines and the pistons in Canis’ mechanical limbs as he tore through the dining room chanting “- _cat cat cat cat cat-_ ” as he chased two in one door, under the table, across the rug and out another door. Other than that, it had been a very dull morning.

 

“I don’t know what I expected.” miss Bush said softly. She turned Frobisher, who was leaning over the side of his high chair as if he were considering how far he’d be able to make it if he jumped. 

“I mean, I didn’t make the schedule. I just keep to it and I seem to be the only one who does.” she frowned slightly, her face a perfect picture of disappointed innocence. It faded quickly, replaced by her usual pep.

“Well. _We_ might as well enjoy our breakfast before it gets any colder, hadn’t we?” she asked with a forceful brightness.

“It’s kinda scary when ya do that. Ya do know that, don’t ya?” asked Frobisher.

“That’s the spirit!” she smiled, clapping her hands together. She picked up the child-sized bowl of porridge and stirred a large spoonful of cinnamon sugar into it.

“Here you are, Frobisher, just how you like it. Ah-!” she lifted the spoon and opened her mouth wide in demonstration.

“You know, I _wanted_ sardines on toast.” said the perfectly-normal-baby-who-certainly-was-not-a-talking-penguin-in-a-frilly-blue-bonnet petulantly. He sighed, tilted his head back, and consented to his nanny dribbling porridge down his throat in the manner baby birds are fed. Miss Bush giggled sweetly and spooned up another bite of porridge. 

 

 

 

 

 

With four minutes until eight, Dr. Troughton had not moved from the spot he’d been when Polly left him to pick a hat. He’d very nearly come to a decision several times, tried on the hat, changed his mind, and played the whole routine over from the top. Or rather, from the topper.

The door of his bedroom was flung open by what appeared to be a tornado with a Scottish accent.

“Ah- just a moment Jamie. I’ve almost got it.

“Ye’ve had nearly an hour!”

 

Sans patience, the young scotsman ripped a random hat off the wall and thrust it onto Dr. Troughton’s head. It happened to be the black stovepipe hat with silver-rimmed goggles around the band, which was one of his friend’s favourites.

“Oh, yes, that’s very nice.” said Dr. Troughton, though he sounded just a bit worried. But his face was quite proud as he adjusted the brim in the mirror.

“Oh, aye.” Jamie rasped grouchily. “You’re lovely. Now eat!” With that, the took the old man’s shoulders, spun him about, and marched him out the door. The older man protested that he was quite capable of walking without the assistance of a stupid Scotman with skinny legs and probably several other soft-worded insults that slowly faded into the general chaos of morning as the pair left the bedroom, with it’s wall of hats, finally empty. A single fez settled slightly deeper on its hook, the tassel sliding to what was now the new lowest point, then overbalancing it and sending it to the ground. Then all was still.


	4. The Belltower Strikes Eight

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Nearly everyone gets out of bed and gets a start on their day.  
> This instalment features Dr. Tennent, his family, Miss Wildthyme, Msr. Simm, Flip, Evelyn, Dr. Davison, McShane, Dr. Capaldi, Leela, miss de Voratrelundar, Peri, Dr. C Baker, Dr. McGann Susan, Dr. Hartnell, Dr. Pertwee, Dr. Eccleston, Dr. McCoy, Dr. Smith, and Dr. Troughton.

 

 

At eight o clock, there was only one person who had as of yet made it out of bed in the Tennent household. That was of course the nominative patriarch, because he was retired and didn’t need to get up to go to work. Something about not knowing precisely how your day was going to go made getting up so much easier. While Wilfred Mott was definitely the oldest member of the household, the idea of him leading it in any way never really occurred the to the group as a whole, unless he were leading them into the dining room for a meal. Which was the general idea he had in waking his grandson. By which child was never made clear as the generation between the two of them was a rather foggy area of the family tree, but it was common knowledge that Dr. Tennent had built up a large and happy extended family about him, and that he was very fond of his grandfather. Though perhaps not as fond of what he was doing at precisely eight o clock that morning.

 

The very picture of domestic bliss, the couple lay soundly in the other’s arms, chests rising and falling slowly as they breathed. A hand was tangled in the wife’s hair, her face pressed against her husband’s chest.

Suddenly, there was a loud bang, like a cannon firing or a wardrobe falling out of a third-storey window, and both Dr. Tennent and his wife sat bolt upright in bed. It was impossible to see much of Rose’s face other than a curve of her full lips and a mass of yellow-blonde hair almost completely obscured her face, but the young doctor’s eyes were open as he was suddenly and forcefully quite awake. 

“What‽” he demanded of the nothingness the noise had appeared from.

 

“…sorry!” answered Wilf somewhat sheepishly from somewhere down the hall. 

“What‽” Dr. Tennent repeated groggily.

Rose let out the breath she held the moment she woke up and fell back on the pillow, covering her face to keep herself from laughing. Dr. Tennent threw the blanket off his legs and slid off the bed.

“Wilf, was that you?” he called.

“Yes, sorry. Don’t get up. I didn’t mean to wake you.”

“Too late for that.” called Dr. Tennent, tying on his dressing gown. “What’re you up to, granddad?”

 

Another voice called from further down the hall. It was female, impatient, and it sounded distinctly under-slept.

“What the hell just happened?!” Donna demanded. Dr. Tennent hurried out of his bedroom, the fear that be might have to defuse an argument this early in the day (it should be noted that while Dr. Tennent himself was usually the first person to attempt to break up an argument, the person most likely to successfully do so was currently rolling over onto the warm spot he had left in their bed) quickening his step. At least his mother-in-law hadn’t popped out of her room like his sister and himself, each of them peeking out of their doors like a pair of _almost_ synchronised cuckoo clocks. She looked up and down the landing, peered as far over the landing as she could without actually leaving her bedroom. Something caught her eye, and as Dr. Tennent followed her gaze he noticed Wilf climbing the stairs with what appeared to be a doorknob in one hand. A mass of mechanics hung off the other end, and all Dr. Tennent could tell from this distance was that the mechanism was _not_ a door lock.

 

“Wilf?” he asked carefully.

“Yes?”

“Are you alright?”

“Yeah.”

“So what’ve you got there?” Donna asked.

“I’ll…” he waved the knob about helplessly, his lips flapping in the air but not making any noise. In the end, he simply tucked the knob into his pocket. “I’ll explain everything at breakfast, how’s that?”

 

The old man smiled weakly at his grandchildren, then turned around and proceeded back down the stairs. The Tennent house was quite large considering the size of the family and the fact that it was built comparatively recently. Some ten years before Dr. Tennent purchased it, an unknown gentlemen purchased the land, built the strange house with it’s many windows and winding corridors, and promptly disappeared. One or two men rented it briefly, but could not afford its uptake and it quickly passed to the young, brilliant, and very suddenly well-paid professor. 

Dr. Tennent himself had made a small fortune with indispensable bits and bobs which were sold in only the very best shops; where rich men could pay the top prices for devices which they weren’t entirely sure of the function of. Much of this money went into his research, but the lion’s share went into turning his home into the largest, most modern and efficient house within the academic end of town, second only to the Baker estate, and they were old money. It looked to be almost half windows from the inside, but from a street view it was clear this was not the case.But the inside was lit as well as if the outside walls were almost entirely covered in windows, and this time of day much of the living space was bathed in golden sunlight.

 

The middle-aged siblings tucked their dressing gowns tighter around themselves and continued their conversation from bedroom doors.

“I notice her mum slept through it.”

“Her mum’d sleep through anything that didn’t land on her.” Donna yawned. “Lucky. I’m going back to bed.”

“C’mon sis, you’ll miss the best part of the day!”

“Which part’s that, then?” she asked hotly. 

 

Dr. Tennent glanced back towards his bedroom, seeing his wife silhouetted against the morning light in the windows. Her silk nightgown and blonde hair seemed to glow like a nimbus around her, and coupled with the way her husband idolised her she seemed for a moment like an angel or goddess come to Earth. He found himself grinning, which she couldn’t help but mirror.

 

“So, we’re not being burgled or killed in our beds?” she asked. He shook his head playfully.

“Not intentionally, unless Wilf wants to make us breakfast. We might as well have stayed asleep.”

“No reason in going back to bed, seeing as its past eight.” said Rose.

“Oh, I can think of a very good reason.” said Dr. Tennent softly. Donna hit his shoulder to remind him they weren’t alone. He cried out in surprise and indignation. 

“Hey! What’s that for?”

“You know what it’s for. I’ll get a hose if you keep that up.” she threatened, serving him another light _fwap_. He raised his hands and backed away.

“Ow! Cut it out!”

“You cut it out, you’ve only been awake for five minutes!” Donna teased. He turned back to his wife to ask if she saw what he had to put up with, but Rose was laughing at them.

 

 

 

 

Roughly at the same time the Tennent family were returning to their bedrooms, two single women had started up a conversation in the street. Beyond their titles, they had very little in common; one was young and one was old, one was dark and one was fair, one was sober and the other was distinctly _not._

“If you need to get home, I could spare you a penny for taxi fare. How far do you need to go?” asked miss Waterfield.

“I don’t need cab fare, I just need a tram token.” miss Wyldthyme explained with exasperation. “At this rate, I might as well return to the pub.”

“Are you quite sure?” miss Waterfield asked. “The trams have passed and shan’t be back for another half an hour.” 

“What is half an hour?” Miss Wyldthyme laughed mirthlessly. “Oh, dearie, if you knew how long I’ve been out… don’t you worry yourself. I’ll find me own way home.After all, you can’t trust cabbies, you know.”

 

 

 

Dr. Pertwee’s telephone rang. The old fop set down his hair brush and strode over to the device. 

“Transcendental Academy Faculty Housing, apartment oh-oh-three.” he answered. At least, that’s what the answer was in his head. By the time it left his mouth, the precise and appropriate answer had somehow rearranged itself so that it almost precisely sounded like, “Yes, what do you want?”

If that shocked the man on the other end of the line, he made no evidence of showing it, rather he himself replied with something far more shocking himself.

“ _Whaaassssaaaaaap?”_ asked a young voice Dr. Pertwee did not immediately recognise. The professor’s face warped into a mask of dismay and remained so for some time. Even as Dr. Pertwee replaced the receiver, walked away from the telephone and tried to get back to his morning toilette, the expression of consternation did not fade. He decided it was best to ignore that particular phone call entirely, but even as he attempted to wipe it from his mind, he was unable to shake the uneasy feeling that came with the inexplicable.

 

 

 

“Master Simm, put down that receiver this instant!” mother Casp demanded. Brother C'rizz came behind Mstr. Simm and took both of his arms behind his back. Mstr. Simm moved as if he were protesting, but laughed rather than make any excuses for himself, like a schoolboy caught in a prank.

“How did he get out of his cell?” brother C'rizz grunted, struggling to hold the mad patient.“And who was he trying to contact?”

“I hardly think that matters, mother Holloway!” mother Casp scolded.

“If one of our most deranged patients puts his mind to leaving his room, entering the nurse’s breakroom and operating the telephone machine to shout some unintelligible dialect at someone, I think it’s relevant to his treatment to find out what was going through his head at the time!” mother Holloway protested loudly. Not many members of the hospital staff would have dared to speak to mother Casp in this way, but having discovered precisely how far wits and talent would raise an American woman in a British mental hospital, mother Holloway had stopped caring about much of anything and spent much of her time arguing with her superiors.

Brother C'rizz, having successfully put Mstr. Simm in an armlock, sighed and pulled him off in the direction of his cell. Mothers Casp and Holloway could argue all they liked about the treatment of the patients, but in the meantime someone had to actually treat them. At least, this was brother C'rizz’s opinion. Despite what brother C'rizz thought, mothers Casp and Holloway were very concerned with Mstr. Simm’s welfare, just not how it applied to him returning to his cell. Another nurse, much younger than the other two, passed the struggling patient and caretaker and stared at them with wide eyes.

 

“Sister Katarina, I could use some help with the door.” 

“You could use some help with a lot of things, scaly.” Simm spat, sounding very angry but still grinning like someone had split his face open. Katarina nodded and hurried in front of them, pushing open the doors between C'rizz and the wing Simm had been housed in. As she tried to open the door to room number six, he continued to protest the sort of nonsense that sister Katarina and brother C'rizz had learned to ignore.

“I don’t want that nurse, he’s turning green! He’s turning green!” Simm snarled, struggling against C'rizz’s grip. “I don’t like him when he’s angry!”

“The door’s locked, brother C'rizz.” sister Katarina exclaimed as she tried the door.

“Then how did he get-” C'rizz’s question was cut off by Simm slamming his head hard into his face. The man’s grip on the other tightened with his pain, and he instinctively slammed the patient against the wall. Sister Katarina gave a little yelp of fright. C'rizz pressed Simm against the wall and turned his head to Katarina, unsure of whether or not his nose was bleeding. It was.

“Get. Mother Casp’s. Keys.” he struggled out while Simm tried to get out from between a wall and a hard orderly. The madman let out a scream of frustration.

“You can’t touch me! You’ve never met me!” Simm screamed.

“Sooner rather than later!” grunted C'rizz, and Katarina dashed back down the hall, crying herself.

 

 

 

Twenty minutes after miss Bush gave up on the Bakers and fed Frobisher, another call came through to the kitchen. The cook and kitchen maid were moving just as quickly and decisively as they had been when miss Bush had called for the first breakfast.

And finally, their work was evident. The fruit was cut for the crepes,and the batter was chilling in the pantry. Most noticeably, the cheese soufflé was being carefully removed from the oven by Mrs. Smythe, so Phipilla didn’t need prompting to answer the bell. Of course, this didn’t stop her from doing so.

 

“Phipilla, the bell.”

“Yes, Mrs. Smythe.” she replied automatically, although her hand was already on the receiver. “Kitchen.” 

“Miss de Voratrelundar speaking. Could you send a set of trays to our apartments? Tea, soft boiled eggs, and toast.”

“Very good, miss de Voratrelundar. It will be up presently.” came out of Phipilla’s mouth before she took a full inventory of what the woman had actually said. She hung up and opened the appropriate dumbwaiter. 

The Baker townhouse had the most complex and intricate dumbwaiter system. Nearly anything could be moved from nearly any room in the house to nearly any other, as long as it could fit into a space the size of a traveling trunk and the person operating it set the dials accurately. It had been installed by Dr. Baker and thoroughly experimented on and adjusted by Dr. Baker; the trouble was neither brother agreed on which once of them was responsible for which part. Phipilla once tried to make a diagram of it, found that the paths seemed to cross, turn in manners no elevator could turn, and generally defy what was physically possible. She elected to ignore this and just mark the wall around the dials with what they actually needed to be set to for her to do her job effectively.

 

“Which one was that?”

“It was miss de Voratrelundar.”

“Which one?”

“I have no idea.” Phipilla admitted. “But they both want trays. Tea, soft boiled eggs, and toast.” Miss de Voratrelundar and miss de Voratrelundar; which was of course to say miss Romana de Voratrelundar and her sister, miss Winifred de Voratrelundar, shared a set of rooms in the east wing. Phipilla didn’t know if she’d be able to tell them apart on sight, she had only ever saw them together, and usually from a distance.

 

Mrs. Smythe shook her head and set herself to the task of freeing the soufflé from it’s bowl. She muttered something to herself, turning back to her work. As Phipilla filled the pan for the eggs, she wondered whether it was something unflattering about the de Voratrelundars or just a comment on the fact that the neither the staff nor the family could be bothered to eat together any day the school was open, and often not even then. There was the family, and the staff, and the de Voratrelundars.

 

“I’ve never quite understood it.” Phipilla admitted. “Miss Bush is upstairs because she’s ordering on behalf of baby; Dr. Baker, Dr. Baker, Mrs. Baker, and baby are the family, and the de Voratrelundars are…?”

“Secretaries employed by Dr. Baker.” 

“So each Dr. Baker has a miss de Voratrelundar?”

“No no, they both work for Dr. Baker.”

“Not the father?” Phipilla asked, wrinkling her nose.

 

“Look, it’s easy.” Mrs. Smythe insisted, turning away from her work for a moment. She gestured with a knife as she spoke. “You know that Dr. Baker and Dr. Baker are brothers, right? They both entered academia because that’s simply what men in this family _do._ Miss de Voratrelundar and miss de Voratrelundar are sisters who both went to secretaries’ college and were hired by Dr. Baker to arrange his affairs academically and socially.”

“And they live here because…”

“Hush.” said Mrs. Smythe. “You should know that the household hasn’t been this small in generations. It’s good that those rooms are being used.”

“I’m sure the chambermaids agree.” the kitchen maid said quietly. 

 

“I don’t see how it matters overly much to you.” the cookwith a tone that suggested the conversation really ought to have been over a minute ago. “I’m not entirely sure Dr. Baker knows the difference between miss de Voratrelundar and miss de Voratrelundar.”

“Well, they’re his brother’s sorceress, they wouldn’t talk much.”

“No, no, the elder brother.”

“I know it’s not _done_ ,” Phipilla exclaimed, “But if we could call them Tom and Colin this conversation would be _lot_ less confusing!”

“No, if we called them Tom and Colin this conversation would be a whole other type of confusing.” Mrs. Smythe said sharply. She scowled slightly. “The things that come out of your mouth some days…”

“I’m sorry I asked!” Phipilla sighed in exasperation. 

 

 

 

Elsewhere in the city, one of Dr. Baker’s (and of course, Dr. Baker’s) colleagues also getting ready for breakfast. But unlike the Baker household, he did not have a large staff, just a large family. Dr. Davison had been more than keen to have the latest gas stove installed, not only because of his fascination with new technology and deep-seated belief that with enough time and whatever tools he had on hand, he could improve it, but anything that made feeding his ridiculous brood easier was worth the trouble of hauling this large piece of machinery up five storeys. It was largely because of this development that Dr. Davison’s apartment had large, circular window in the kitchen and the rest of the building had gas lamps installed. 

 

Now, a quarter after eight in the morning, all four burners on the stove were running, and above them the young professor kept a running stream of mild annoyance as he flitted from task like a bird. A pancake was turned, the sausages stirred, another egg added to the pan and at least the teakettle didn’t need his immediate attention all the while he was cooking. It was rather like looking after his wards, in a way: trying to keep your attention on four things at once and discovering whenever he was finished with one that another needed his attention two minutes ago.

“If only _one_ of them had the common courtesy to lend a hand with breakfast, I just might get this done without burning anything. Where is Adric, didn’t I just ask him to come in here? I suppose it is my fault, can’t take my eyes of that boy for a moment, can I? I’m quite sure Nyssa would be only too happy to help if she were up, excellent point, where _is_ Nyssa?”

He turned his head towards the bedrooms while stirring the eggs. 

 

“Nyssa? Are you up yet?” he called. “Anyone who _is_ up, do come in here and get the table set. Breakfast is nearly ready and I could use a hand with it!”

The young professor turned his attention back to breakfast, muttering about how he was to get anything done with his assortment of wards around.

 

 

 

 

 

Meanwhile, back at the Baker residence, a short, curt exchange was taking place over the internal telephonic system. 

“Ahoy, Mrs. Smythe.”

“This is Miss Jackson speaking, Mrs. Smythe’s engaged at the moment.” 

“Ah, I shouldn’t be surprised. Busy woman, Mrs. Smythe.” purred a deep, rich and yet vaguely unsettling voice on the other end on the telephonic device. “I won’t keep you. I just wanted to know if you could send something up to the dining room for breakfast?”

“Certainly, Dr. Baker. Anything in particular?”

“Oh, surprise me. But not unduly, something edible would be preferred.”

“That’s mainly what we’ve got in the kitchen, Dr. Baker.”

“I’m glad to hear it.” he laughed. “And send something up for my dog, would you? He’s looking rather peaked and we can’t have him eating one of the cats.”

 

 

 

At eight-twenty, Dr. Davison’s youngest ward pounded furiously on the washroom door, his patience fully expended.

“Kamelion, get out of there this instant!” Adric shouted, “You don’t even have a bladder!”

 

 

 

The ruckus Adric was raised was enough to be heard, somewhat muffled but nonetheless heard, two apartments further on in the faculty housing. The apartment between the two of them was empty at the moment, but the one on the other side could hear all the better for the relative stillness of apartment 006. 

“Oi!” the neighbour shouted through the wall. “Other people live here, you know!” She pummelled the wall with her first until she was fairly sure she’d shouted as least as loud as the boy had. Satisfied with the two of them on the same footing of poor neighbours, the young woman turned her attention back to dressing.

 

Thus far, she’d gotten into a shirt and trousers, which mostly went to show how little just wearing trousers did to disguise one as a man. Now, while there was nothing stopping a man from wearing a loose shirt and trousers, even with hair as long and untamed as McShane’s was at the moment, he would probably be doing so in a novel hidden behind a more scholarly, if less educational, book.

As for herself, she’d gone through enough of those novels and a handful of the closest to their heroes she could find, and at the moment McShane would have been far more interested in a book about a brooding young lady in a gentlemen’s shirt and trousers sweeping other young ladies off the moors. But, for all that she looked rather the romantic figure at the moment, it really wouldn’t catch quite the attention she wanted at the moment. McShane finished off her shirt studs to the neck and put on a brocade waistcoat.

 

She wanted to look smart today, but there was always the careful balance between looking like a dandy and looking like a dancehall performer, which was harder to tread when you happened to be a teenage girl disguised as a teenage boy. She pulled her hair back in a simple queue and regarded the effect in the mirror. Men did wear queues in the city, and in her opinion it made her look far more masculine than hiding it all under a cap would have done. She did have a strong jawline in her favour, and with her hair she could very easily trick people into thinking that boy just looked a bit girlish because he had long, dark blonde hair. She let it go and tossed it about a bit. Men, even dandies, didn’t keep their hair as smooth as ladies, a part of the deception she was only too pleased to take part in. She frowned, adjusted the angle of her face and pulled her hair back into a queue. It would have suited her down if she’d been in evening wear, loose hair with a top hat and opera cloak and pretending to be that Romantic hero again but not for walking out. Not that McShane owned an opera cloak, but she did have tails and she did have every intention of wearing them should today’s events unfold favourably. 

If she had bit more time, or if she intended to spend the day working, she would have requested Dr. McCoy’s assistance in putting it into a French braid. It was near impossible to French braid one’s own hair, but it was very useful for keeping it out of explosives while you mixed them. She already had all the explosives she was likely to need today mixed anyway.

 

She put on a jacket, hiding whatever curves the waistcoat missed, completing McShane’s disguise. Everyone who knew her in this city knew her as _Dorian_ McShane, and that was something she intended to keep them thinking. This wasn’t to say that there weren’t a few select individuals who she’d let on about the ruse, but even with them she still used as masculine name.

Dorian, or Dorothy to absolutely no one she was still on speaking terms with, had nothing against being a woman intrinsically, but rather a lot against being treated the way most of the people she encountered treated women. It wasn’t that she didn’t like women, much less being one; quite the opposite. But around age sixteen, she had decided she had quite enough of being Dorothy McShane, and a good deal of that was tied up in having no interest whatever in being what society in general and her mother in particular believed femininity entailed.

 

 

 

 

It was three minutes of nine. The inhabitant of Faculty Housing Apartment 12 had been told by several people, largely his students and the closest person to what other people might term as a “friend” (he’d be more likely to call her any number of things ranging from “short” to “bossy” to “alright”, but his preferred form of affection was to insult her and feel vaguely awkward) that he needed to get out of his apartment before nine thirty in order to get his classes ready to actually be taught. But he’d decided that those people were busybodies and not nearly as important as his breakfast.

 

The silver-haired man had prepared himself a truly magnificent spread: toast and jam and eggs, back bacon, fried tomatoes, sausage as well as a small pot of beans. There was nothing saying he actually intended to _eat_ the beans, in fact they were almost hidden behind the coffee carafe. And at one end of the table, looking more content than he ever did in the company of others, was Dr. Capaldi. He was one of an unusual type of Englishman, the sort who actually ate a full English breakfast on a regular basis. It didn’t really show on his figure, though, he was a tall and wiry old man. He seemed to eat as much as he did in order to power the mild frustration that propelled him through the day.

 

 

 

 

At half after eight, Dr. Davison’s kitchen was awash in barely controlled chaos as five people attempted fit around a table meant for three and eat their breakfast. 

“Budge up, would you?” Tegan muttered, pressing the arm of her chair against the one next to her.

“I’m as ‘budged’ as I’m going to get.” Turlough grumbled. Tegan opened her mouth to argue, but was interrupted by Nyssa passing her the sugar pot.

“I’m done with the sugar, if you want it.” Nyssa offered. This seemed to derail the argument, in so much that Tegan became more interested in her tea than Turlough. Dr. Davison breathed a sigh of relief that at least one of his children didn’t want to kill another one of them. As long as she was conscious, Nyssa was a very nice girl.

 

“Turlough, pass the sodium chloride.” Adric said between bites.

Turlough picked up the salt cellar and waved it in Adric’s face.

“I will pass you the salt when you admit this is is salt.”

“Turlough, pass him the salt.” Dr. Davison scolded. The ginger boy slid the salt cellar across the table. Adric reached for it, somehow knocking over a jar of strawberry jam in the process.

Adric sprang forward with the awkward reflexes of a young man with a sweetheart who was very clever but prone to fainting. Unlike Nyssa, however, the jam jar had no preference to Adric’s arms over the floor and splattered the front of his shirt before smashing at his feet.

The rest of the family stared at him with expressions ranging from pity to bewilderment, to poor attempts to stifle laughter, to a matter of fact sort of resignation to the fact she wouldn’t have having jam on her toast this morning; from Nyssa, Dr. Davison, Turlough, and Tegan respectively.

“You’ll need to change those clothes, Adric.” Tegan commented between bites of dry toast. Adric, who had only just gotten out of the bath, looked crestfallen.

“But I haven’t finished breakfast!” he protested.

“And you’re not going to school like that.” Dr. Davison said firmly, moving Adric’s plate away. “Change.”

 

 

 

 

Birds chirped merrily in the sky, small aircraft passed above as other professionals began their morning commute. Dr. McGann was quite sure it was going to be a very good day. He latched the front door behind him, straightened his coat, and started walking towards the centre of the campus. He had lost a bit of time trying to find his pocket watch, but in the end he’d located it.

He wasn’t entirely sure how it had gotten into his teapot, but as he found the watch before he added the tea, it didn’t matter overly much. At least now he had found it and was ready to—he patted the pocket of his waistcoat. And then the pockets in his frock coat.

“I know I had it somewhere…” he muttered to himself, as he had gotten into the habit of doing. He often told himself talking to himself aloud was a bad habit, but he usually said this aloud as well. “…I’ll lose my own head next.”

The professor touched his neck, as if checking to make sure his head was in fact still there. Now he remembered with a sigh of disgust.

“I found it, but I didn’t put it in my pocket!” Dr. McGann muttered, spinning on his heel. “It’s still on the dining table-!”

With frustrated grunt, he rushed back inside to retrieve the item.

 

 

 

 

Meanwhile, at the tram stop nearest the Baker house, three women were waiting for the next tram with varying levels of composure. First, Miss de Votredundar, that fair-haired woman who worked as secretary to Dr. Baker when he was at the college, sat primly with her legs crossed at the ankles and a newspaper in her hands. Every part of her physical appearance fought to be the primmest: her fair hair was arranged elegantly under a cherry-trimmed hat, her grey dress neat and clean and trimmed with red lace, her boots shined, even the newspaper looked pressed. 

Beside her, a tanned ginger woman who appeared of a similar age watched her movements intently. To be more accurate, _physically_ she looked of a similar age to miss de Votredundar, but her expression was one of childlike fascination, unblinking like a cat watching receptive movements. She watched the world around them with interest, glancing between the building crowds on the road and the newspaper and the wire that would shortly bring the tram to them, but always falling back to her companion. Her dress looked to be of the same quality of her companion’s, but the dark green velvet showed more wear around the ankles and the shoulders, and the lace was probably not quite that shade of cream when it was first made. The heels on her boots were much lower, and far more scuffed; as if she did the running for both of them. While the dress fit her perfectly, something about it looked more uncomfortable and unnatural about it. 

Standing slightly away from the other two, miss Wyldthyme tugged her not-leopard wrap close around her shoulders. She hadn’t had much luck finding a tram token, and had spent the last hour walking to the next closest stop to her home.

“Ooh, my feet!” she moaned, settling herself to a seat like a series of tiny avalanches. “Didn’t think I’d make it here for a moment there. It’s getting a bit too early for me. Or is it a bit too late? Hard to tell this time of day… if it is that time of day…”

 

Iris trailed off about then, muttering a few more barely audible words like a record running down. She had the uneasy feel of someone’s eyes upon her, which normally she didn’t mind at all, or at least it didn’t surprise her. She looked up to see who was looking.

While miss De Votredundar was very firmly still reading her newspaper, either utterly fascinated or determined not to make conversation (and quite possibly both), her companion was staring directly at miss Wildthyme.

The ginger woman made unblinking eye contact with the older woman. The fact that she only just met her gaze didn’t seem to be taking into consideration. The redhead was making direct eye contact and had been for some time before Iris’ eyes were even visible. It was quite unsettling.

“Oh, gave me a right start there, dearie. Got two eyes like a camera, you do. Think you’d be looking right into my soul, you was.”

“Do cameras see souls?” she asked earnestly.

“I… I don’t rightly know, dearie.” Miss Wildthyme admitted. “It’s the sort of thing that people say, but I haven’t ever put much thought into the matter.”

“Then why did you say it?” she asked.

“Ooo… I don’t know. It’s just—“ she faltered, then hiccupped. “You gave me a funny turn, you did.” 

 

The redhead looked curiously at Iris, sussing her out.

“Romana, I think this woman is drunk.” said the youngest woman.

“Almost certainly, Leela.” said Romana, closing the newspaper. “You will encounter more of those in the city, particularly late at night or very early in the morning.”

“It is not early.” said Leela. “The sun has been in the sky for hours.” 

 

Iris elected to ignore the poor note this conversation started on and pressed on.

“You wouldn’t have a spare tram token for an old woman, would you?”

“What is that?” Leela asked.

“What is what, dearie?” asked Iris. She glanced behind her, wondering if the young woman had seen something she hadn’t.

“What is a tramp token?”

“Payment for the transport we’re waiting for.” Romana explained, not looking up. “The carriages pulled along ropes through the streets and into the sky. They require specific coin purchased at stations where their operators are changed. Our tokens are provided by our employer, Dr. Baker, who while hardly stingy is practical and as such does not provide us with more thanis necessary to commute between the townhouse and the college.”

 Leela nodded thoughtfully.

“A payment for the ferryman.” she muttered, still nodding.

“If you like.”

“And you have none?”

“She hardly be asking us for one if she did, Leela.” said Romana, folding her newspaper. It could hardly keep her interest during this conversation. She would have to finish her reading on the tram. “And I doubt that she would be asking us for a spare if she had the money to buy one of her own. This woman is ”

“Miss Romana de Votredundar!” miss Wildthyme scolded. “Don’t pretend you don’t know me! We grew up on the very same road, we did!”

“With respect, miss Wildthyme, you were quite grown by the time I was born.”

“Ooh, what cheek!” the old woman squawked. 

 

At eight thirty-two, Mrs. Baker was having about as much luck getting out of bed as Miss Wyldethyme was having getting into it. This would refer to of course to their own respective beds, although there was a rumour to the effect of Miss Wyldthyme being perfectly happy to take Mrs. Baker’s place in bed; with or without Dr. Baker moving himself. But if one held truck with rumours, then Mrs. Baker wasn’t sharing a bed with her husband at all.

But now, with the sun slanting through the windows, Peri felt a bit warmer about the idea of getting up.She rolled over, fighting gravity to climb out of the trough her body had left in the featherbed. She very nearly made it to a sitting position for a moment.

Her husband sort of blindly groped towards her without properly waking up, wrapped his arm back around her waist and pulled her back into the warm dent in the blankets she had until that moment been occupying.

 

“I _was_ going to get up.” Peri commented dryly, looking at the ceiling. Her husband shook his head as best as he could while it was still on the pillow.

“Why in Heaven’s name would you want to do that?” he asked softly. His hand moved towards her cheek, slowly, as if he was still asleep. She adjusted her shoulders just enough to face him, just enough to let his fingers brush the disarray of her hair off her face. He smiled fondly at her, and she found herself unable to her but smile back.

“Consider the world outside: steam and smoke choking the sky. Weak, petty people failing to embrace their best natures. The world were I am considered no better than the black sheep of an already scandalous family; violent, rude, and unloving. The world that insists you are far too pretty to be of any use. A world that would reduce the most compassionate, tender thought to a hardened and bitter rumour.”

He stroked her cheek.

“And consider the bed: soft, warm, containing a mad jumble of amatory limbs that make every appearance of being one body. This is the boundary of the universe, Peri. The universe contains but two people: yourself and I. The nature of the universe is simply us, a nest of warmth and uxorious adoration. What world could ever compare?”

Peri smiled fondly at him, taking the hand from her cheek and pressing it to her lips for a moment. He smiled again.

“You’ll be late for work if you don’t get up.” she pointed out.

“Let me be late.” he replied, drawing her back against his chest. Peri nuzzled his neck fondly, burying a hand into his curls. That was quite enough of an attempt to get up for now. 

Once they had stopped moving, a fat grey tabby leapt off the end of the bed and glared up at them. Just when she’d gotten comfortable around the couple’s feet, they had to wiggle closer together and disrupt her sleep. Another, older cat was perfectly happy to stay where he was and keep on sleeping, as were roughly three visible cats hidden around the bedroom, but the bed was moving too much for the tabby’s taste. She stormed out of the room, tail in the air and with a great air of offence.

 

 

Back in apartment 001, there was considerable more energy and general awareness that it was forty minutes after eight and that classes were to start in just over three hours. Susan had just finished describing her dream to her grandfather, with minor interruptions to remind her to swallow between sentences.

 

It was true that Dr. Hartnell was not much of a cook, and preferred to leave the preparation of anything he actually intended to eat to either someone else or a mechanical device. The “breakfast machine” really could not be trusted to make anything other than oatmeal and omelettes, but had a clearly marked dial for pastry neither of them had dared try for since a week after it had been installed. It wasn’t even as if it had made _good_ pastry when it was fully functioning, but as often as it would spit out tough, coffee-flavoured crust around an unidentifiable and overcooked jam, three unrequested cheese omelettes would appear followed by a high-pitched shriek. Dr. Hartnell told his granddaughter that he would look into it, but part of him didn’t actually want to know why that was happening.

 

As it was, the two of them were currently finishing off the curiously square ham and cheese omelettes the machine produced and discussing whether the record Susan had been listening to had an affect on her dream. They each also had small glass of health tonic sitting beside their tea, for all that Dr. Hartnell had a scientific mind, it would just as easily fixate on something as the gospel trust as nonsense. And it had decided that the ingredients ofthis particular tonic was just the thing for old men and young women.

 

Susan picked up her glass and wrinkled her nose.

“Now don’t make that face, that’s the finest tree boils in that.”

“Oils, grandfather.” Susan muttered, looking at the greasy tonic. She tossed it back an grimaced. “It still tastes like soap!”

“Well, well, that just means it scrubs out your insides, won’t it? Hm?”

“Yes, grandfather.” she grumbled, clearing her place.He nodded approvingly, until her finally caught view of his granddaughter in full length.

 

“Good gracious, child. What, _what_ precisely do you think you’re wearing, hm?”

“It’s my school uniform, grandfather.” Susan said innocently. Dr. Hartnell scowled. Susan knew precisely what he was talking about, even if she didn’t admit it.

“On your feet, child!” he said brusquely. She turned her toes together in a way that was either intended to be sweet or petulant. He wasn’t entirely sure when or where she had bought purple patent leather boots with far too many straps and bright brass buttons, but judging by the state of them, she had worn them at least once before.

“We can wear any shoes we like to school.”

“Even those? They are hardly… hardly what I would consider practical. Not at all.”he frowned to himself. “Didn’t happen in my school days…”

Susan leaned over the back of her chair and smiled.

 

 

 

 

 

Dr. Pertwee pulled to the side of the road. It was a quarter to nine, and while he wouldn’t have listed her as one of his friends, he couldn’t quite bring himself to drive past miss Wildthymestaggering home this late in the day. In general, he considered himself to haver fairly modern ideas about the fairer sex, but there was a modern outlook on life and then there was neglecting to help someone in need. And miss Wildthyme _had_ asked directly. Or would, once she saw him. At least if he passed her without offering, he would feel guilty about it. It probably helped the matter that he was particularly fond of her niece, and if he came into work and told his assistant that he had drove past the old woman on the way to work, he would find himself more than a little ashamed.

 

“Jon Pertwee, as I live and breathe!” she exclaimed, looking at himself raptly. “It has been ages, hasn’t it?”

“Good morning, miss Wildthyme. Are you in need of assistance?”

“More than you know, dearie.” she said with a cheeky grin. The old woman gathered her skirts in one hand and bustled over to the side of his canary-yellow motorcar. Really, Dr. Pertwee had no business thinking of miss Wildthyme as “an old woman” when he thought of himself as a “mature” man. Dr. Pertwee was no mature in any sense of the word, but it was a very fond delusion of his.

“Oohf.” she muttered, bracing herself on the door of the car and rotating one foot in the air. “You wouldn’t believe how long I’ve been walking. I left Nation’s Pub early, and I’ve been trying to find a way back since.”

“Early for you, or early in the morning?”

“I never!” miss Wildthyme gasped, a hand on her breast and her mouth an impressively wide circle of shock. “I’m not sure I want a ride from you, Dr. Pertwee, if you’re going to be asking that sort of question!”

“Come now, it’s a perfectly good question for an old friend. Particularly an old friend who is doing you a favour.” Dr. Pertwee tutted. “It isn’t as if I asked you whether you were trying to get back home or back to Nation’s public house.”

He reached over and opened the passenger side door for her.

“We will need something to talk about on the ride, won’t we?” he said. While he might have been aiming for a slightly apologetic tone, it had more of an air of finality. 

“It’s lucky you came across me when you did. My knight in a shining motor.”

“Oh, just get into the car, would you?”he said crossly. However it sounded, Wildthyme grinned and clambered into the seat with the sprightliness of a woman less than half her age. Nearly the sprightliness of a woman the age ofthe scotch she’d been drinking.

She bounced a bit in place to settle herself, crossing her legs and fluffing her stole as if she was preparing to be photographed. She smiled affectionately at the old doctor, who returned the expression with only the slightest apprehension and started the motor.

 

 

 

At eight forty-nine, a bizarre rattling noise rattled through the comparably utilitarian quarters of Dr. Eccleston. This was the sound of him waking up. He grudgingly opened an eye and pulled himself up on the Spartan iron bed frame and rubbed his face with one hand. Another bizarre noise followed this, the slow exhalation of air trilling, a bit like blowing a rasp. He'd dreamed of the war again, but only in the first few hours of the night. Before two, the same images of carnage and destruction seemed dull and crept back into the corners of his mind, almost as if they were ashamed that they had asserted themselves in the first place. All the nightmares left in their wake were a feeling of weariness, like he had never slept at all.

He would be fine once he'd had his tea, but mornings were the worst part. He lived alone these days, and sometimes he would roll over once or twice rather than find a reason to get up. 

He'd fallen asleep in his undershirt again, which was hardly surprising. It wasn't so bad before his ward had gotten married, but now that he was alone in his apartments again, they seemed too large and too dark and too quiet. Especially first thing in the morning, when the only light was the thin grey sunbeams weakly breaking through the windows and leeching colour from the already dull room. He never saw the point in decorating it, or properly cleaning it, for that matter; he was never in. The idea of staying in one room for any amount of time was absurd. 

He would be alright when he was outside, when he was laughing and in the thick of whatever he could find to throw himself into. But just now, he was alone, in dark and only slightly dusty quarters waiting to convince himself to get out of bed and having trouble finding a reason.

 

He threw his legs over the side of the bed and searched for his discarded trousers with his feet. As he did this, he stretched his arms into the air and gave out a yawn that would put a lion’s roar to shame. His hands fell limply back into place, one hand rubbing the velvety stubble on top of his head. Pulling his trousers up, he began to stagger around the apartment without really opening his eyes. After a moment, he reached the window, pushed up the glass and parted the shutters. It wasn’t until he was half-hanging out of the window that he really started to feel awake. The cold air on his skin did him some good, and he yawned again.

 

The world below him was moving, motors speeding along and beeping irritably at one another. Pedlars and knife sharpeners cried their wares, pushing creaky carts or attempting to goad half broken towing engines to move the carts for them. The streets were growing thick with people, and above them the trams and light aircraft spend with far more alacrity and intention than they had during the night. A few people in bright red or violet suits and dresses moved slowly through the crowds, rarely pausing at carts unless they had no practical use. The flowerless seemed to be doing a brisk trade this morning.

He smiled to himself. It wasn’t something that would normally be called a weak smile, it was a grin that split his face in two, but it didn’t quite reach his eyes. His eyes were weary, still flashing horrors that had visited him in his nightmares, but managing that weak smile he felt.

Today would be good.

 

 

 

 

“Professor, are you sure you’ve got that handled?”

“Not remotely, Do _r_ ian.” chirped the spritely little man. “But I don’t think that you coming at this stage would help anything.” 

The coal stove that marked out what section of Dr. McCoy’s apartment was a kitchen was at the moment surrounded by a curious copper and wooden framework, like a tinker toy or a complex set of pneumatic pipes. It chirped and dinged and set out little puffs of steam at regular intervals, but it was difficult to say what it actually did, beyond the fact that it did all of it right in front of your eyes, observable every step of the way. There were all sorts of little curving paths and tubes for food to rush through, but the complexity of the device made it quite difficult to tell what was supposed to be fed in through what end and how it ended up in the frying pan at the bottom. 

He frowned, then picked up his umbrella and gave the side of something with a wobbling dial a light smack with the end. There was a sputtering noise, and a small pile of fully-cooked flapjacks dropped into the waiting frying pan, followed by some heavenly smelling coffee spurting into a copper cup that wouldn’t have been appeared to be removable from a little flower of four mugs rotating in place unless you had put it there yourself. The cups span, and another was filled with tea. They span once more, and two spurts of milk filled the cups to the top.

 

Dr. McCoy turned around with the two breakfasts balanced on each of his hands and a smug expression on his face.

“Not _handled_ so much as _completed._ ” he said proudly.

“Enough gloating, let’s nosh!”

 

 

One would have thought that removing yourself from a pile of stuffed animals and dressing in a tweed suit and bow tie would make one appear older. Sadly, in the case of Dr. Smith it was a bit of a hopeless case. Though he was now in his late twenties, he retained the face of a schoolboy, or perhaps one of those funny little dogs who are cute because they are ugly.

He was quite determined to impress his maturity on any who would listen. He had a tenured position and an office and an assistant who gave every appearance of delighting to fetch him biscuits. He wasn’t precisely sure what miss Osgood was actually supposed to be doing and if she did it when he wasn’t looking, but he did like the idea of having her around. She was very kind to him.

He even had a wife, though he wasn’t quite sure how that happened or what he was supposed to do now that it had. He suspected, somewhat sadly, that it probably involved at least having breakfast with her, but she was nowhere to be seen and he hadn’t any idea where she might be. She could have just as easily been abroad as in his drawing room, and in his experience those were not even the two most likely places.

Some old friends of his had a wild daughter, somewhat older than him who found herself incredibly taken with him from even before they had met. They had been married, but distinctly in a “marrying off” sort of way: the general idea was that both of them would settle down a bit with a happy married life to come home to. This is not the way it worked at all, however, and it quickly proved to be in everyone’s best interests if Mrs. Smith pursued her interests and Dr. Smith pressed his and they meet only occasionally, as whenever they _did_ meet each of them would make the other considerably worse.

 

As such, Dr. Smith found himself eating his bread pudding in relative silence, broken only by his muttering odd little exclamations and planning his day aloud in a haphazard, backwards sort of way, and looking sadly at the empty chair opposite him, with a second intact bread pudding in front of it. She suspected that being married should at least involve breakfasting together. Not that he had the slightest idea of where she might be. 

 

 

 

 

Having finished his breakfast, Dr. Troughton carefully slipped out from under his friend and guardsman’s watchful eye. After all, the stovepipe hat with the goggles around the brim may have been his favourite, but had he been wearing it too much recently?

A second check would be all he needed, just to run his eyes over the hats and be sure that he _really_ made the right decision. After all, Jamie and Polly were still talking over breakfast, and he would be able to have a moment to himself. He slipped inside and quietly latched the door behind him, ready to give decision making another go.

“Oh, my giddy aunt!” he exclaimed. The last thing he expected to find in his hat room was Jamie, folding his arms and looking cross.

“Finished yer breakfast, doctor?” Jamie asked sharply.

“Well, yes. As a matter of fact, I have.” he replied, trying to tug a little dignity into his rumpled suit.

“Yer ready to go now, aye?”

“Of course I am.” he pouted, stepping aside. “Lead the way.”

The scot looked knowingly at his friend, and then exited the room. Rather, he _tried_ to, but at the exact moment that Dr. Troughton attempted to, resulting in them wedging themselves firmly into the door frame. With only the most friendly grunting and shoving, they extricated themselves, straightened their clothing, and strode briskly from the room.

 


	5. The Belltower Strikes Nine

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Between the hours of nine and ten, the residents of London (and particularly those involved with Transcendental Academy) get up and out and start their days. This chapter features Barbara Wright, Ian Chesterton, Danny Pink, Clara Oswald, Dr. Tennant, Rose, Donna, Jackie, Wilfred, Dr. Davison, Tristan Farnon, Dr. McGann, Dr. Troughton, Dr. Pertwee, Dr. McCoy, Dr. Smith, River Song, Tegan Jovanka, Ace McShane, Mtrs. Gomez, Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart, Dr. Baker, Dr. Baker, Peri, Sarah Jane Smith, Harry Sullivan, Sam Jones, and Kamelion.

 

At nine, Mrs. Baker made another bid for freedom. 

She sprang up rather suddenly, leaping out of the blankets almost like a gazelle. This comparison was particularly apt given the way her husband threw his arm across her and roll onto her like a hunting lion. They both fell with a soft thud onto the mattress, in different positions then they had started in but not much closer to the edge of the bed. 

She rolled onto her shoulder and looked up at her husband fondly, who returned a groggy smile. His curly blond hair had gotten ridiculously tousled and one of them had undone most of his buttons in the night. She laughed softly at how foolish he looked when he wasn’t properly awake. Dr. Baker was not awake enough to understand why his wife was laughing at him and frowned slightly; then pressed her back into the pillows with as firm a kiss as he could manage. From the way it was returned, he could only assume that that settled the argument about leaving bed for the moment. This was wrong. No sooner had he pulled away for air than Peri, stroking his hair with some combination of affection and an attempt to keep him at bay, began to speak very matter-of-factly, proving that she might not have been moving but she had certainly been awake for some time.

 

“I just heard the clock. It’s nine.”

“I heard nothing.” he lied.

“We need to get up.”

“I need no such thing.” Dr. Baker retorted. Peri gave another one of those frustrated smiles worn chiefly by wives reminding themselves they actually _chose_ to be married. 

“Sometimes I really wonder why we-” Peri began. He placed another long kiss on his wife’s mouth. As he drew away, she continued like nothing had happened.

“-had a child.” she said coolly. “I mean, I’ve already got you.”

 

 

 

To say that love was in the air might not have been totally inaccurate, but comparing the scene taking place outside Coal Hill School at the same time as the Bakers’ general decision to stay in bed didn’t really seem fair to anyone involved. The comfortable and causal relationship of two people who had been married long enough to know there is no escape isn’t really comparable to couples not quite prepared to hold hands while walking but very intent on walking _together._

Apart from that minor detail, the couple currently climbing the steps were if anything _more_ attached to one another. Perhaps one that involved less arguing and more casual greetings sounding extremely significant.

“Good morning, miss Wright.”

 

The tall, elegant woman looked over her shoulder and smiled, pausing while Ian took a few extra steps in a hurry, then setting off a slow pace that would hopefully compensate for the fact neither or them were looking where they were going. 

“Good morning.” she replied warmly. Their shoulders all but touched as they walked, which would have been enough for either of them to draw comment if their students attempted the same. Strictly speaking, it would have been enough for miss Wright to clear her throat significantly and stare at them until they stopped or Mr. Chesterton to attempt to engage at least one of the student in a conversation uncomfortable enough to kill all amorous thoughts in their tracks. As a science teacher, most anything related to his class could do the trick, but he particularly liked an excited discussion about the rate of decay in various substances, the gases expelled by this, and thus the inevitable fate of airtight caskets. Even that wouldn’t have dulled the keenness with which he’d struck up a conversation with his colleague.

 

“I’ve been meaning to ask you about something.”

“What is it?”

“It’s about extracurricular activities, in a roundabout sort of way.”

“I should hope you’re not organising another meeting with a parent. You may not remember the last time we met wit ha parent outside of school and while I can’t say I _disliked_ the experience, I do not care to repeat it.”

“I remember it fine, Barbara.” Ian said quickly. “It’s more in concern of the city fair later this month. I’m sure you’ve heard that the school has offered to run a booth.”

“Yes I have. Toffee apples, was it?”

“That’s what Mr. Pink was rallying for. He was quite set against the shooting gallery.” 

“He always is.”

“I was thinking of volunteering at the booth.” Mr. Chesterton said quickly. “Do my part, as it were.”

“I considered that myself, but I can’t say if I’ve decided.” miss Wright confided. “Have you?”

“Well, it becomes rather dependant on how you were intending to perhaps… volunteer yourself? Or to simply…”

“-or to simply attend?” Miss Wright finished with a smile. He beamed back at her.

 

A pair of slightly younger teachers passed. They weren’t looking at Mr. Chesterton and miss Wright, in fact they were very carefully looking anywhere else and that made the whole situation even more awkward for everyone involved. They hurried past, not making eye contact and the general muttering of each other’s names mixing into a single “miss ter Oswrightepinkerton.” as everyone hurried along as quickly and politely as possible. 

“I suppose they think at least _some_ of the teachers don’t know they fancy each other.” said miss Oswald, the first of them to muster an ounce of dignity. Mr. Pink made a face that was really attempting to be a smile but looked as if he was preparing his face for close, repeated contact with a blunt surface. 

 

Half of him wanted to turn back and give Miss Wright every reason why it was rude to talk about someone while they were present but not involved in the conversation and every reason but one why a shooting gallery was a terrible thing to ask children to take part in. Half of him wished he hadn’t heard miss Wright at all. Another half reasoned it would have been alright if he heard her only only hadn’t gotten so cross about it. Half of him wished that there was no one present but himself and miss Oswald, and another half wanted even himself to not be present, for the ground to swallow him up and leave only miss Oswald at the top steps of the school.

Given that he was a maths teacher, he was fully aware that came out to entirely too many halves for one man. Clearly, each half had several opinions shared with only part of itself and part of the other half. 

 

 

 

 

The canary-yellow autocar veered wildly across the road as its driver avoided another friendly pinch. Dr. Pertwee slowed the vehicle to a crawl and glared at his passenger.

“Madam, if you insist on carrying on in this manner, I may be forced to ask you to leave my car!” 

“Alright dearie, keep your hair on, I was just-“

“I know perfectly well what you were ‘just doing’, miss Wildthyme, and I insist that you stop!” Dr. Pertwee snapped. “You’ll drive a man to distraction, and the roads are bad enough this time of day without an autocar crashed in the centre of the street!”

“Such a tone, Dr. Pertwee! You would never abandon an old friend by the side of the road, would ye?”

“No, Miss Wildthyme, but I’m quite willing to abandon you.” he answered tersely. “Particularly if you remain unable to keep your hands to yourself.”

“Oh, cheek!”

 

 

 

Unlike the Baker household, the Tennents ate together.In general, the Tennents felt that this was an indication that they got along better with their family than the Bakers. However, if you were to ask the Bakers, it was a question of knowing how much time you could spend around someone without wanting to wring their neck. Perhaps there was something to this thought, Mrs. Tyler suspected, as her in laws filled the dining room with conversation and laughter that she couldn’t help but feel was entirely too loud for nine o clock in the morning.

 

A basket full of hot buns all but flew around the table, as the various members of the family assumed there would be a point where two other people were talking and they would have the time to actually eat them. Wilf took two and sent it along.

“I thought perhaps we could visit that new exhibit on the findings from Dr. Baker’s latest exploration.” Rose suggested, taking a bun. She looked around the table. “All of us, I mean.”

“I can’t,” said Dr. Tennent. “ They’re having me work late tonight.” 

“Doing what?” asked Rose. “Can’t you check papers just as easily at home as at the university?”

“I could, if it were checking papers.” her husband replied with an exasperated expression. “There’s a joint project with Dr. Smith they’ve asked us to do, and somehow we’ve got to work it around our classes. What’s more, Smith hasn’t given me his schedule, so trying to find him is a nightmare.”

“Bit thoughtless, him.” Mrs. Tyler commented, ignoring the affronted “mum!” that followed. 

“Oh, why not have him come round?” Rose suggested. “We haven’t had anyone to dinner for ages. Is he married?”

“I believe so,” Dr. Tennent answered, his brow furrowed. “He rarely gives a straight answer on it.”

“Well, ask him if he’d join us.” offered Wilfred, always friendly. “We could all eat together and the two of you could use your study, couldn’t you?”

“Assuming it’s not a lab thing.” Donna pointed out. 

“I’m still not sure whether the two of you would get on like a house on fire or set our house on fire.” Dr. Tennent commented. His sister gave him a little glare across the table, and he gave her an entirely too wide grin in response.

 

“Oh, here’s a question.” Donna interjected. “Why is it you don’t work with that nice Dr. Davidson anymore?”

“Davi _s_ on.” Dr. Tennent corrected.

“What about him?” Donna asked. Rose started laughing, and after Donna was sure it wasn’t at her, she started laughing as well.

That was when Mrs. Tyler saw why Wilf had taken two buns. He’d eaten neither of them, but rather skewered each on the end of a fork and was making them dance across his plate. Mrs. Tyler stared aghast at her in law. Wilf paused for a moment, turning the bun-feet inward sheepishly.

 

 

 

Far away from Rose’s laughter and rather missing it, Dr. Eccleston dipped his spoon into his porridge and wondered how much more he would make himself eat before he left. The fact of the matter was that he wasn’t much of a cook, and the act of eating alone always struck him as pathetic. Most things did, if you did them alone. He hated it. 

His rooms looked a bit like a hotel, no sign of who lived in them. He spent as little time in them as possible, preferring the noise and speed of his office at the university. What little home comforts the apartment held were left by the last tenant; a Dr. Grant, who no one at the school spoke of. Dr. Eccleston had long since discarded the malfunctioning automation, though.To the best of his knowledge, part of it was being used to repair one of Dr. Davison’s pet projects. Dr. Eccleston fit the image of a professor about as well as his room fit the image of a home: in his shirtsleeves and bracers, he looked a bit more like a dockworker.

 

With a sigh of disgust, he pushed the bowl away and got up from the table. He’d buy something from a the kitchens on campus. They at least had good coffee. Some of the students had habit of getting nervous when they saw one of their teachers eating with them; a kind of mixing of classes far more dangerous than skiving off school and finding a public house dank enough to not ask how old they were. It wasn’t that he liked making them uncomfortable, but he found it tremendously informative to find out which of them _were_ made uncomfortable. He made a loud, messy show of pouring the black coffee he’d attempted to make down the drain, dropped his dishes in the sink, and paused as his coatrack only long enough to grab his driving goggles and worn leather coat. It was tremendously old fashioned, bought in 1819 and close around the neck. But it fit him, it kept the wet out, and he liked it. He snapped the goggles around his forehead, he would pull them down when he got to the ground level.

He had motorised a velocipede, and as terrifying as the concept was, he had to admit a certain joy in whizzing through the streets, seated just slightly above the tops of most carriages and the perfect height for grinning at the carriage drivers and see a flash of their startled faces as he whirred past. Dr. Eccleston was just that level of contradiction, both the happiest sad person you would ever meet and the saddest happy one.

 

 

 

It was a small miracle that Dr. Davison got his wards out of the house before nine. He made a mental checklist of the morning as he trotted briskly into the school campus. Shepherding the four (five, by some counts, but he’d removed the key from the Kamelion unit and he wouldn’t return it until he was quite sure how the Mesmer discs worked, the last time he had encountered it running, it convinced him it was a rather dangerous schoolmate and he nearly destroyed it) of them around was a full-time occupation of itself, and he had already chosen a career, which while admittedly also put him in the close vicinity of many more young persons than he was at home.

 

As he approached the building where his first class, Dr. Davison ran through the morning in his head. He felt as if he had forgotten something, or _someone_ , but he couldn’t place what it was. He was quite sure he’d gotten a breakfast into each of his wards, but it was a bit hazy after that. Entering the building, he murmured each of their names over and over to himself, doing a mental headcount of his charges and whether or not they were at least _on route_ to where they were supposed to be when he left for work. 

“ _Nyssa, Tegan, Turlough, Adric, Nyssa, Tegan, Turlough, Adric, Nyssa, Tegan, Turlough…_ ” he hissed to himself as he ran, unable to shake the feeling he had forgotten something.

 

Nyssa was the first one ready, as was to be expected, but Nyssa operated at some sort of capacity that Dr. Davison didn't quite understand. As a rule, she either completely had a handle on things or was totally helpless, and it was while the first was more likely the second could come at any time. Before Dr. Davison had taken her into his care, she had been a princess (or duchess, the translation for her actual rank wasn’t very precise, she had been young, female, and important) from somewhere near Russia. Shortly after he made her acquaintance, however, her father, stepmother, and entire household had been murdered, their manor razed and their servants run from the land, and the country had generally no longer been a safe place to keep her. Dr. Davison, feeling partly responsible, took her on as a ward with the general idea that a more suitable home would be found for her in time. However, she made short order of being an indispensable mediator between her adoptive siblings and their guardian, and it was generally, though silently, agreed when if she left the others ought to look for other homes as well.

It was astonishing what Nyssa had learned in preparation for being royalty, even more so what she _hadn’t_. She may not have been able to know how to throw a cricket ball or make change for a pound, but she was an absolute expert in being presentable and ready at a specific time. This was a gift she had attempted, with no success whatsoever, to impress upon Adric. 

 

The only really successful way that Dr. Davison found to get Adric out the door in the morning was to force Turlough and Adric to travel to school together, because Turlough would physically drag with adoptive brother out of the building by his collar if necessary. It also had the benefit of Adric stopping Turlough from attempting to do something foolish, like use Dr. Davison’s motor to get there. Turlough was under the impression that he was an excellent driver. Turlough was wrong.

Adric joined him somewhat belatedly as he pulled his boot on, wearing a fresh school uniform, identical to what he had been wearing before except for the fact it wan’t covered in strawberry jam. Turlough whinged the entire time about being late, and the two left together trailing a series of arguments that eventually faded into the distance.

 

That left only the eldest, and on this particular morning, Tegan mentioned she had somewhere to go before work and disappeared with minimal fuss. It made her guardian make a mental note to worry about what she was up to when he had a moment. Getting his wards out of his flat before nine may have been a small miracle that the Dr. Davison performed on a regular basis, but he never found himself any less impressed with it.

 

He still felt that he had forgotten something, and he was unable to shake the feeling until he entered the classroom and was distracted by a young person not normally in his care. The student was also fair haired and round-faced, in fact he looked rather like a younger and more intoxicated Dr. Davison.It was said the only way to tell Dr. Davison from young Farnon was that the student was usually laughing and drinking and the professor was usually one cup of tea from nervous upset. Dr. Davison refused to see any similarity and defended his mental state to anyone who would listen. Upon being interrupted by the professor, the student hurriedly extinguished a cigarette.

 

“What are you doing here?” Dr. Davison asked curtly.

“I’m sorry, professor, but did no one tell you? Your class was moved.”

“Moved _where_?” he asked in clipped tone.

“Well, how could I know that?” the student asked innocently. “I only just found out when-“

“When you were looking for an unoccupied classroom to smoke in.” Dr. Davison finished crossly. “If you _must_ do that to yourself, kindly do it outside where no one else has to smell it. It’s not healthy at all.”

 

Dr. Davison left the room, once again muttering angrily to himself, but at least it was now about the school board rather than his wards. Overall, he wouldn’t have ranked the average sense and maturity of either group particularly over the other, the main difference was that was he expected to look after his wards, and the school board was expected to look after him.

 

 

 

 

 

At a quarter after nine, Dr. McGann was trotting down the street as quickly as foot traffic would allow him. Despite the fact that classes didn’t start until eleven, the campus was usually awash with students slowly lumbering about the campus like steam engines running with half the required coal. Or, in some cases, napping on the quad. He never quite understood that, several of his students at eleven o clock lectures looked as if they hadn’t fully woken up yet, which suggested that they had found a way to sleep through their classmates creeping in and out of their rooms with subtlety ranging from field mice to a herd of running elk. Perhaps students could simply sleep through anything.

As for the professor himself, he hadn’t made it across the campus yet, partly thanks to the fact that the teacher’s dormitory was distanced a fair space from the classrooms. He would have to find out why that was at some point, even though he suspected there was very little he could do about it. The teacher’s dormitory was so far removed from the rest of the campus that he actually had to cross into the main part of the city at two points, and London was a terrible thing to surprise someone with.

Dr. McGann didn’t understand that at all. He did enjoy a certain amount of exploration, but he enjoyed it when eh wasn’t trying to get to work, and he suspected that most teachers didn’t want to leave the campus at all unless it was completely necessary. The professor was sadly unaware of exactly how turned about the route he took was, and how much of London he would have been able to avoid by simply using a map. Running through general traffic was just one more annoyance,even if that annoyance was the only benefit as well. 

On most days, catching ride was an unnecessary expense what a professor couldn’t afford, but on rare occasions he found himself so far behind schedule that it became an extremely necessary expense. This was one of those occasions, and so Dr. McGann found himself chasing down some faster travel than his own, still bare, feet. Quite suddenly, he paused his attempt to catch the attention of a Hansom cab. There was something he was forgetting. Something other than the usual.

“Come now, doctor,” he muttered to himself, “There isn’t much left to forget. You’ve got your pocket-watch, and your papers are in your valise…” he looked at his empty hands.

“…which is on the floor next to your dresser, where you left it when you went back in for your pocket watch…”

 

 

 

As Dr. McGann dashed back towards the teachers dormitories, he passed two of his coworkers in the road. He counted himself fortunate that he was on foot, as the road was completely clogged with Dr. Pertwee’s attempt to get his canary yellow auto-car into the road before Dr. Troughton’s half-steam half-clockwork three wheeled monstrosity, which was considerably smaller and infinitely slower. Likewise, Dr. Troughton had attempted to pass Dr. Pertwee, and now neither of them could immediately move without damaging the other vehicle. Of course, given their long acquaintance and professional relationship, the two professors were settling the problem with all the decorum expected of gentlemen of their age and education.

 

“You bumbling, half-wit, half-sized fool!” Dr. Pertwee roared, punctuating his anger with expressive quacks of his car horn.

“Well there’s no need to shout!” Dr. Troughton shouted back, just as crossly as the white-haired man. “It’s hardly as if you could get any closer without actually stepping out of your car!”

“Good morning Dr. Troughton, Dr. Pertwee.” Dr. McGann muttered quickly, dashing past. He did strange little pirouette on one foot and hopped backwards for a moment as he shouted, “Terribly busy, must dash, good to see you!”

“Good to see you indeed!” huffed Dr. Pertwee. “You must be having an entirely different morning than I am, young man, I suspect you even have some hope of getting to class before we all die of old age, without this witless little gnat blocking the way!”

“It would be a quicker death for some of us than others!” Dr. Troughton retorted.

“I’ve never heard such twaddle in all my life!” the old fop snapped. “Stop lallygagging in the the middle of the street and move your… silly little contraption! Perhaps off the road entirely, and do everyone a favour!”

“Move _where_ , fancy-pants?!” Dr. Troughton demanded. “In case you having noticed, that noisy oversized motor is blocking the any path out!”

“Well, we can’t _all_ drive about in matchboxes on wheels, can we? _Some_ of us can’t fit in a pocket.”

“No, you need to prance about in some newfangled whatsit as oversized and noisome as its driver!” the short man howled, bouncing in his seat. This infuriated Dr. Pertwee to the point that he stood up in his seat to shout, and probably would have throttled Dr. Troughton if the windscreen hadn’t gotten in the way.

“What did you call my motor?!”he demanded. “I say, what did you call my motor?”

 

“Good morning Dr. Troughton, Dr. Pertwee. Lovely day, isn’t it?” chirped a high little voice behind the two motors. The two men stopped arguing for a moment to see what had made that noise. Dr. Troughton wasn’t used to hearing any voices lower than he line of vision, even when he wasn’t aided by the motorised tricycle. 

Another coworker deftly strode through the traffic in such a way that it would have looked like he was in danger the entire time had he been anyone but Dr. McCoy. With one hand using his umbrella like a cane and the other lifting his hat straight into the air, he nodded cheerfully at the arguing men and carried on his way as if nothing had happened.

 

It was then that doctors Troughton and Pertwee realised that somehow during their argument, Dr. McCoy had gone between the two of them and was now some distance ahead of them, while they were still blocking each other from moving at all. 

“Did you see that?!” Dr. Troughton demanded. 

“Yes, I did.” Dr. Pertwee sniffed disapprovingly. “Some people lack the least sense. Weaving through traffic like that, so terribly unsafe.”

“Yes it is.” Dr. Troughton huffed. “Especially when one is driving an oversized, overpowered, and overly loud heap of spare parts as that!”

“You’ve hardly in a position to criticise, sitting astride a pedal skate with ideas above its station!” And in roughly this fashion, the two resumed shouting and carrying on just as heatedly as they had before either teacher passed them.

 

 

 

 

Dr. Smith took another bite of his bread pudding, considering his position in life in general and it martial status in particular. It was most inconvenient, and he had no idea where it had come from or what to do with it; especially when his wife didn’t so much as show up at breakfast, much less share his bed-

“Hello, sweetie.” 

 

Dr. Smith looked up and discovered that his wife was sitting at the end of the table, despite the fact he had not heard her come in, much less sit down across from him and start loading her plate with breakfast.

“Where have you been all night?” Dr. Smith asked.

“Spoilers.” she smirked knowingly.

“What—what does that even _mean_?” he asked helplessly.

“It means I’m preparing you a nice little surprise.”

“I don’t think I like surprises.” he said cautiously.

“Of course you do, sweetie.” Mrs. Smith said confidently, buttering a piece of bread. “Everyone likes surprises. And after all, I know you best, and I know precisely what will and what won’t surprise you.”

“Do you?” he asked cautiously.

“Of course I do, dear.”

“Oh…” he muttered helplessly. “I suppose that’s alright then.” Dr. Smith turned his attention to his now cold bread pudding and found himself wondering what precisely he wanted his wife present _for._  

 

 

Precisely on the dot of nine-thirty, Dr. McCoy jovially toddled into he room where his first class would be in an hour and a half. Few men could properly _toddle_ , largely because most men saw no point if perfecting the art. He had a strange, endearingly bouncy way of moving, not so much like a drunken man and more like a wind up top that would carry on spinning for a good five minutes after you expected it to stop. One could argue that there was no point in perfecting the toddle, but Dr. McCoy relied on as many people as possible taking him to be a sweet old man, and few things projected “sweet old man” like a perfected toddle.

He tossed his umbrella over his shoulder in such a way that it looked purely lucky that the handle bounced against the ground and sent the whole thing flying end over end until it hit the hatrack, nearly tipping it over but righting itself as the umbrella swung into place. His hat followed suit, spinning around the top of the stand for a moment before settling into a position that would be impossible for the squat Dr. McCoy to dislodge without aid of the umbrella. Which, if the previous day was any example, would knock it off the top of the hatstand and directly onto Dr. McCoy’s waiting head.

His coworkers, as one man, refused to ask where Dr. McCoy had picked up this skill, particularly because not knowing gave them the opportunity to imagine him helplessly tossing hats and umbrellas around, only to have them land hard on his head until he had perfected the art.

This hatstand had started its life in Dr. Davison’s apartment, but he had removed it to his classroom to make room for two wards passing without snarling at each other like cats, and from there the object bounced from room to room without anyone appearing to move it. 

 

Dr. McCoy hadn’t brought any papers home with him the previous night, and that left him with a certain amount of reading he needed to do before classes started. He pulled open a drawer and pulled out a sheaf of handwritten papers. He had read a few of them the previous night, but there were a few left to cover. He gave the turntable of inkwells on his desk a spin, stopping it precisely at the centre of the red bottle, which he uncorked.

He took a dip pen from inside of his coat and got to properly reading, chuckling occasionally.While he sometimes annotated the papers, he rarely wrote a grade anywhere on the paper, much to the distress of his students hoping that a grade would indicate whether or not they had any idea what he was talking about.

Most people were not quite sure what Dr. McCoy taught, including his students, but the most popular guesses were psychology and philosophy. Which resulted in some _very_ interesting papers, although his favourite he’d read this semester came from someone who thought that Dr. McCoy’s two o clock lectures were on Astronomy. Dr. McCoy thought this was a good a guess as any of his students, and he looked forward to the look of distressed “I wrote that at two in the morning, I have no idea what it means” when he asked the student to support his hypothesis that the surface of the sun was the texture of burnt toast.

 

It also meant that he wasn’t carrying a valise with him, he didn’t need to, because there was nothing other than himself he needed to transport to his classroom that morning. While he liked the idea of keeping this as mysterious as anything else he did, one of Dr. McCoy’s little idiosyncrasies which would one day turn out to be of momentous import, the fact was he was not keen on bringing anything inflammable into a house that also contained McShane.

 

 

 

At that precise moment, no house contained McShane. While her mentor was grading papers with the sort of cheer that would strike terror in a student’s heart, the _garçonne_ was doing what some people would describe as “flaunting her depraved lifestyle” but McShane would describe these people as “lonely old codgers who are just jealous I look better in a suit than they do.” A third, less emotionally attached group, would have described McShane’s actions as sitting casually on a park bench and watching various people pass. This last group would concede that McShane _was_ doing it in a brocade waistcoat and relatively unscuffed trousers, leaving people a bit confused as to rather they were looking at a very beautiful man or an equally beautiful but scandalous woman. 

 

Her eyes moved through the thickening crowds, a shoe shop with a proud display of the latest sporting boots, a milliners’ which it was said Dr. Troughton had a constantly fluctuating credit with, past the airbus station she remained a tactful distance from, pausing at a likely-looking tearoom nearly as far from both her and the airbus station as the airbus station was from her. Someone approached the park bench from behind, and as McShane turned around to see who it was, her face broke into a grin. The other woman thought that was quite the picture; McShane draped over the park bench, beautifully dressed and grinning, the sunlight gilding her loose hair, slightly androgynous but just decidedly feminine enough to be quite the romantic figure; and filed it away in her mind for later perusal. She wasn’t entirely sure how her little meetings with McShane were to end, but however they did, she was quite sure that that particular image would stay with her until her dying day. Tegan had been quite sure of her feelings toward her own sex for quite some time, but that particular moment was a extremely pleasant reminder.

“Good morning!” said McShane with a genuine smile, which was impossible not to return. 

“I hope I didn’t keep you waiting.” said the Australian conversationally, settling herself next to McShane on the bench.

“Don’t mind, it’d be worth a much longer wait.”

“Oh? How long _would_ you have waited?” asked the Australian woman with a hint of mischief in her voice.

“Dunno.” said McShane. She curled her hand around Tegan’s. “How long would you have kept me waiting?” Tegan outright refused to blush, even if that meant looking absolutely everywhere but at McShane. She did give her hand a squeeze, though.

 

McShane offered the conductorette her arm.

“Cuppa tea? My treat.” McShane offered. Texan’s eyes moved to the tea shop.

“On the porch, or in the back?” Tegan asked significantly. This was not actually a question of where they were sitting so much as how close they could sit without rousing comment.

“I’ll let you decide that, I think.” said McShane. She gave her… yes, ‘sweetheart’ was definitely the correct word at this point in their relationship, her sweetheart a significant glance. Tegan grinned at her, taking her arm.

“Well, there’s no sense in us ruining our complexions, is there?” Tegan asked brightly.“Let’s get a table in the back today.” McShane gave a little laugh, and the two stood, keeping their arms linked the entire walk to to tea shop.

 

The trick, McShane found, to being in an “unthinkable” relationship, was to think nothing of it. As mortified as certain people might have been to see, for example, Nyssa retreating behind a bicycle shed with Adric following a bit too closely to be a coincidence, that was also the sort of person who could watch her and miss Jovanka walk arm in arm to the same shed, shut themselves inside, and think nothing of it. Though to be fair, McShane intended to escort miss Jovanka someplace at least slightly more up-market than behind a bicycle shed.

 

 

 

It was somewhat disheartening to think that even as Tegan and McShane were keeping a polite distance in their courtship, it was expected that Dr. Smith and Mrs. Smith would be involved in _some_ sort of martial activity. But unless finishing breakfast very quickly and insisting you needed to be at work counted, Dr. Smith was not particularly interested in martial activities that morning.

It was unfair to say that Dr. and Mrs. Smith had a loveless marriage, they both insisted that they were each fond of the other as they lied, avoided each other, and generally made both each other and the people around them very uncomfortable. The trouble with Dr. Smith’s romantic life was that his “mildly aroused” face and “in fear for his very life” face were nearly identical, and neither he nor his wife seemed to understand what caused one over the other. To be fair, all his expressions erred on the side that most people would describe as “abject horror”, but it was very difficult to look sultry with the face of a six year old with no eyebrows.

 

Looking more the schoolboy than the professor, Dr. Smith dashed awkwardly out of his house, limbs flailing like a frog being electrocuted. He simply _had_ to be at the school in time for classes, and that would probably take him the hour and twenty minutes he had before then. Well, if he counted time for breaking some beakers as soon as he entered his classroom, which he was almost guaranteed to do. It was just practical, really.

 

 

 

Elsewhere in the city, an entirely different sort of man was appearing at an entirely different sort of job. Lethbridge-Stewart opened the door to his office, expecting to find it more of less in the same order that he left it. While he had not left an elegant middle aged woman lounging with her boots up on his desk and reading _The War of the Worlds,_ part of him wasn’t terribly surprised to see her.

“Mistress Gomez, I believe.” said the brigadier, reaching for his sidearm. “It’s a bit difficult to recognise you with your nose in that book.” Slowly, the woman marked her place and set the novel down.

“I’m surprised at you, Lethbridge-Stuart,” Mtrs. Gomez cooed, “Don’t you know it’s rude to interrupt a lady’s reading?”

 

“But thank you for coming here. It makes catching you much easier.”

“Catching me? My dear man, I didn’t know you cared.” she said sweetly. “I’m flattered of course, but my heart belongs to another.”

“I mean to arrest you and you know that perfectly well.” he snapped.

“Arrest me? Whatever for?”

“Breaking and entering, for a start, then we’ll see about the charges for practically everything else you’ve done with your life.”

“I may have entered your office, but I broke nothing.” Mts. Gomez countered, handling her parasol curiously. “Except perhaps that guard, but he _was_ being so very difficult.”

 

 

 

It was ten minutes until ten, and the elder Baker brother had finally admitted that if he didn’t get out of the house sometime in the next hour, it was very probable that he would encounter his brother, and even worse, Colin might attempt to actually _make conversation_ with him. That was more than enough of a reason for him to get a move on.

 

There was a great fluttering about of staff, maids all but flying from door to door in an attempt to not be where ever it was that Dr. Baker was going to be, and to their shock he seemed to actually moving towards the front door. In his head, the part the noticed the staff at all was quite pleased that they were seeing him off for such a simple thing as a day working at the university. In reality, the only two people really concerned with where Dr. Baker was actually going were miss de Vortelundar and miss de Vortelundar. Romana had already set off to the college, and was even now was puttering about Dr. Baker’s office at the university, sorting out the physical impossibilities in his schedule, finding papers he claimed to have lost, and just generally getting more done before he arrived than he was going to do all day.

That left Winifred waiting beside the door with a packed lunch and a haughty expression which reminded Dr. Baker entirely too much of his mother. He decided to ignore this and accept the valise and basket of what smelled unfortunately like a corned beef sandwich. This was unfortunate because Dr. Baker happened to know that they didn’t have any corned beef, and hadn’t for a week.

 

“Anything I need to know before I leave, miss de Vortelundar?” he asked, accepting the items.

“Your first class is at 11:40, you are expected to give a lecture on lighter-than-air travel at that time and the theoretical applications of tesseracts in air travel later in the day.”

“Is it theoretical?” asked Dr. Baker, knotting his eyebrowitng in confusion. “I thought I’d achieved it years ago.”

“Which, I believe, is why they want you to speak on the subject.” she answered curtly. “We will expect you home at five a clock, if there are no changes in your schedule.”

“You would know that before I did.”

“Yes. I would.”

 

The door opened, and since neither of them touched it he could only assume there was a butler somewhere in the mass of people he wasn’t particularly interested in at at the moment. It wasn’t that they were staff, or that he thought that they were any further beneath him than any lord, it’s just that Dr. Baker was nearly constantly having a fascinating conversation with himself inside his head and everyone outside his head were either his very dearest friends or so many potted plants, and on very rare occasions, both. As it happened, there _was_ a butler, but he was operating a mechanism Dr. Baker’s brother installed four years ago, which allowed the doors to be opened while standing a good six feet to left. Dr. Baker had noticed it twice before, took notes on how to improve it, and actually got them to his brother a month later. Dr. Baker had no memory of this anymore, which was just as well, since Dr. Baker reacted to the suggestions by shouting about how insulted he was and tearing them up, and then sulking in the smoking room a good two hours before Peri collected him.

 

“And is there anything _I_ need to know before you leave, Dr. Baker?” miss de Vortelundar asked curtly. The doctor frowned thoughtfully. It was an impressive frown, the man had a mouth that didn’t seem properly attached to his face.

“Nothing I don’t imagine you already know.” he said at length. “Just do what you see fit, miss de Vortelundar.”

“I always do.” she said simply. The two nodded at each other, having reached an excellent understanding for a business relationship, and Dr. Baker merrily strode out to where his …. _vehicle_ was waiting. He had experimented multiple times on assorted forms of transport, always choosing innovative systems over not looking like a complete imbecile. His latest invention was no exception. In places, it resembled a bicycle, a wheelchair, a typewriter, and a tuba. As a whole it probably moved and that was all that could really be said for it. 

Happily oblivious to the curious looks the staff was giving him, Dr. Baker deposited the items miss de Vortelundar gave him in a basket, strapped driving goggles to his head, and started up the bizarre machine. It gave a series of honks that might have been musical had they been arranged differently, then started puttering away from the townhouse with the very respectable and very, very batty Dr. Baker borne on it’s back like it were a donkey.

“What on Earth _is_ that thing he’s driving?” the butler asked miss de Vortelundar quietly.

“I can’t say for sure what it is now, but appears that the exhaust pipe started it’s life as a brass horn.”

“That would account for the noise.” she said simply. The two looked at one another, and retreated back inside to get on with their business for the day. At least now _one_ of the madmen who employed them was out for the day.

 

 

 

The omnibus that carried the various respectable workers toward the southern end of London, including those who made the very subtle and important distinction of working _for_ the military base on the south end of the city and not _in_ the military base, was expected to be at the stop at ten o clock sharp. Therefore, Sarah Jane Smith was not remotely surprised to find herself chasing it down as it barrelled past the stop at four minutes to ten.

 

“Oh, stop! Stop! I’m here!” she demanded, holding her hat in place with one hand and rather wishing she had been wearing better shoes for running. She made a mental note to mention that at her next suffragette meeting, mannish blouses and hats were simply a style thing, what women really needed were boots which wouldn’t turn your ankle if you stepped wrong.

For a few yards, she looked down to make sure that her skirt was well out of the way of her feet, doggedly trailing at exactly ten inches longer than her arm away from the back rail of the omnibus. Then, quite suddenly, someone grasped onto her hand and Sarah found herself naturally gripping back.

“Steady on there, old girl!” the owner of the hand exclaimed, as both he and Sarah hoisted her onto the little platform on the back on the omnibus. Once she was able to grab the railing firmly enough to dust herselfoff with the other hand, Sarah found herself looking up into the eyes of one of the few people who Dr. Baker thought of as both a friend _and_ a potted plant.

 

“Harry!” she exclaimed. He lifted his bowler hat in greeting. Sarah frowned slightly, gave her skirt a final swipe, and strode past him into the main part of the car. He followed after, looking unfortunately like oversized terrier. The image was advanced by the cheerful stream of nonsense he was producing.

“I am always jolly pleased to see you well, of course I am always pleased to see you well but particularly when we cross paths while travelling to our place of employment, and if you don’t think it’s too forward of me, that is, if you wouldn’t mind terribly, I think it should benefit us both if I were—well, to meet you, as it were. It is no trouble at all, after all, and a young woman travelling alone might be accosted by all manner of ruffians, scoundrels-“

“-and coworkers.” Sarah finished, smiling at him. It wasn’t a particularly nice smile, but it was the sort of not nice smile reserved for people within your circle of friends. Sarah took a seat, and while it did happen to be the seat Harry was attempting to offer her, she seemed fairly oblivious to that fact, and nearly as oblivious to the fact that he took the seat next to her. Harry folded his hands and angled his body towards Sarah, clearly keen on continuing what passed for conversation when Sarah wasn’t interested in the subject. Harry opened his mouth to start this up again, but the woman across from Sarah was quicker on the draw.

 

Being from the place in society that was going to work at three minutes to ten and not coming home from work at five-forty, Sarah was not privy to the conversation that described this woman as “a git” some time earlier this morning. All she really knew about her was that she was young, fair haired, and looked a bit tired for this time of day.

“I don’t mean to intrude,” Sam asked somewhat meekly, “But.. well, it’s if you don’t mind me saying, your appearance, are you one of those… suffragettes? Or have you another occupation?” Sarah shook her head and began explain.

“Suffragette is not an occupation-” Harry coughed heavily here, which both women ignored. “-rather, a way to open a host of new occupations which previously have been closed to us. So I would say that a suffragette is who I am, and what I am, that would be my occupation.”

“Which is, if you don’t mind me asking?”

“I’m a journalist, as it happens.” said Sarah proudly. “Miss Smith: First woman to work in that particular newspaper, quite a honour.”

“Oh?” asked Samantha. “Which newspaper is that, then?” Sarah pressed her lips together tersely and looked uncomfortably into the distance.

“ _Transcendental Academy Monthly Journal._ ” she answered quickly. “It’s really quite scholarly and terribly exclusive. It’s produced some of the most reprinted scientific articles of the decade.”

“I… I’m afraid I haven’t heard of it.” Sam admitted. “But, with the hours I work, I can’t admit to being able to do much reading.”

“Really?” Sarah asked keenly. “I’m _always_ interested in writing about the difficulties the working classes are forced to bear while the upper get on without noticing them, particularly when they’re women.”

“Have you considered the plight of the chorus girl?” Sam asked. “Oh, please don’t frown, miss Smith, but I have noticed that we’re looked down upon, even by our patrons. It’s not at all like prostitution, but we’re treated as scarlet women! I know one of the girls in my line is putting her fiancé through medical school, trying their to improve themselves…”

Sarah reached into her coat and produced a small commonplace book and a pencil.

“Fantastic! If you could refer her to me, I would like to speak with other girls at your theatre, any of them at all. Now, may I use your name in the article, miss…”

“Jones, Samantha Jones.”

“A pleasure to meet you, miss Jones.” said Sarah with a smile, before turning her eyes back into her book. “Tell me how an average day starts, for you.” Samantha smiled and began to speak at length. Harry settled himself in for a long ride of feeling slightly awkward.

 

 

 

At a minute to ten, Dr. Davison’s apartment was as still as it ever could be. Slowly, the key in the back of the Kamelion Unit moved, winding the automata up, until to began to move with small clanking noises. The Mesmer discs where its eyes would have been were it a human began to turn, but with no one present, it was unable to hypnotise anyone into thinking they were speaking to anyone else. With slow, inhuman movements, the automata walked to the front door and checked that it was locked. It was, and from the outside, as was to be expected.

 

“Alone again.” said the automation with a distressingly human voice. It turned away from the door, and walked slowly back into the centre ofthe room. It considered ways it might amuse itself until the other occupants came home, and ultimately decided it would have a look around Dr. Davison’s workshop, perhaps do some reading, and take no care whatsoever to put anything back where it belonged. It prided itself on some of the more inventive places it moved small objects and the range of reactions it caused. Moving one of Nyssa’s gloves to Adric’s pillow, for example, created a reaction totally different but equally as interesting to moving any Tegan’s books to Adric’s bedside table. Or moving every one of Dr. Davison’s screwdrivers one peg down. And moving Turlough’s crystal, which he claimed could allow him to perform seances, was infinitely entertaining. He could move it four inches to the left in his top drawer and the boy would be in hysterics for hours.

The apartment was not quite perfectly still, but as still as it ever could be.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> “The surface of the sun is the texture of burnt toast.” is a bit of an in-joke purely for my amusement. When my father was at MIT, one particularly late and sleepless night, he wrote that the surface of the sun was the temperature of burnt toast. I misheard this as “the texture of burnt toast” for many years, because no one would let the story die. Perhaps it is only that the phrase never failed to make me laugh as a child that I included it here.


	6. The Belltower Strikes Ten

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Between the hours of ten and eleven, various people connected to Transcendental Academy attempt to start their days. This installment features Dr. McGann, miss Bush, Frobisher, Mmd. Vastra, Jenny Flint, Strax, Chang Lee, Braxiatel, Mr. Jago, Dr. Litefoot, Duchess O’Mara, Msr. Ainley, lady Me Astrid, Dr. Tennent, Donna Noble, Wilfred Mott, Kate Stewart, Dr. Capaldi, miss Romana de Votredundar, Leela, Dr. T Baker, Susan Foreman, Ping Cho, Vicki Pallister, Dodo Chaplet, Nyssa, Zoe Heriot, miss Shaw, miss Grant, miss Miller, Dr. C Baker, Mrs. Baker and an octopus.

Dr. McGann was back on the street, running at a gentle clip, keeping his eyes open in the vain hope that he would pass another hansom, unlikely this close to the centre of campus and even more unlikely at the hour. But at least he had the papers he needed to finish that article. 

“I’m running late, but it’s well worth it… it would have been disastrous if I arrived at work without my notes on angler fish of unusual size,” he murmured to himself, petting the valise. “Put back the article another month… oh good heavens, what if I…?” 

 

The young professor stopped dead and opened his valise. He shuffled the papers around, tentatively at first, but more agitated until he had flipped through each section in turn.

“…I _have!_ ” he roared in disgust, whirling in place and tearing back toward the teacher’s dormitories at top speed. He all but collided with a student, shouting apologies after him but not slowing down in the least. Dr. McGann cursed himself as he ran, forgetting to look into his valise when he picked it up, forgetting everything from his watch to his notes and why in heaven’s name was running hurting his feet? He looked down and realised that he never actually put his shoes on that morning. He let out a quiet roar of frustration and hastened his pace.

 

 

 

Shortly after ten, the respectable young of the upper class were given a view of the sky above the city’s parks. Miss Bush and Frobisher were among them, guiding and riding a perambulator respectively. It was a state of the art model any respectable family would have been proud to own, even without the helpful additions the infant’s father had made. The gleaming brass work and plush cushion were to be expected for something carrying the latest addition to a upstanding family, the retractable canopy with rather more lace than one person could easily make by themselves minor luxuries. But the most interesting aspect of it was that there was a small motor in the bottom, and the pram could arguably propel itself down the road for some distance, had it not been for the safety mechanism in the handle, much like the breaking system on a bicycle, except that unlike a bicycle, the breaks were engaged if the nanny’s grip loosened for any reason. If miss Bush was not gripping the handle, the pram would not move. Dr. Baker was very insistent that he install and test the breaking system himself before his wife was visibly pregnant, and the entire system was registered with the patent office a month before the child was born. That said, it was hardly the first invention he would list off when expounding on his various contributions to society, an activity Dr. Baker would engage in at the drop of a hat. Most people assumed it had been invented by his brother, anyway.

 

The pram, and indeed, who it contained had attracted the attention of another family taking the morning air. They had no children as such, but on this particular morning they were accompanied by their butler, who was fulfilling the role admirably. He bent over the pram, examining Frobisher eagerly, while miss Bush smiled kindly and kept the brakes engaged, lest the poor man be barrelled over by a rogue perambulator trailing its nanny.

 

“And what a handsome boy he is!” Strax proclaimed, bending over the carriage. “So healthy and strong, he’s sure to be a great military mind one day! A beautiful child!” Frobisher recoiled slightly.

“Not sure how to take that, comin’ from ya.” he murmured, or would have done, were he a talking penguin and not a baby. Jenny looked at her companions in dismay.

“Am I the only one whose noticed that child is clearly a pengu-” she began to exclaim, but her wife put up a very significant hand.

“It isn’t polite to comment on these matters.” Mmd. Vastra said quietly.

 

 

 

Nearer the edge of the park, a middle aged gentleman passed closer to an alley than he perhaps should have done, and found his path blocked by a youth, no older than twenty andrecently out of America, judging by his voice. This was all somewhat secondary to the fact that as soon as he was well between the older man and the street, he drew a small knife from his jacket and gestured threateningly.

“Alright, I don’t want no trouble.” said Lee. “Wallet on the ground, mister, and we can both walk away from this.”

“Walk away from way from _what,_  young man?” asked Mr. Braxiatel,

“This! This is a robbery! I’m robbing you!”

“Are you actually attempting to rob me, young man?” Mr.Braxiatel asked, sounding amused.

“Uhh… yah?” the youth asked, becoming confused.

“That is quite possibly the worst idea you’ve ever had.” 

“You don’t know my life!” Lee snapped.

“You have a rather a _lot_ of bad ideas, then?” Mr.Braxiatel asked conversationally. Chang Lee mouthed vaguely confused exclamations of disgust, but before he could pick which one he was actually going to say, he was interrupted by a conversation taking place behind him.

 

“…one of those Chinese chaps, you see them about the theatre. I’m fairly sure he’s one of ours.”

“ _Yours_ , Mr. Jago?” asked his companion. “That sounds rather proprietary.”

“Well, not mine in an ownership sense, of course. This is 1863, of course. An enlightened age, no one owns another human, even an exotic sort. No, no, I mean our… like they’re our children. Children of the theatre, good man. As are we all, come to that, Dr. Litefoot.”

 

Chang Lee lowered his knife and turned around in disgust. Shockingly, Mr. Braxiatel placed his hands in his pockets and watched the proceedings with detached interest.

“Are you talking about me?” he asked.

“Oh, excellent English, young man! Very well done indeed! Only a bit of an accent.”

“…I was born in San Fransisco…”

“Well, that can’t be helped, can it?” Jago said jovially. “Sorry I can’t place your face, dear boy, but you know how it is, running a place like this. Can’t well remember every act, can I? You one of the acrobats, then? I did say they should add a bit of knife-throwing, spice the thing up a bit, what!”

“Yeah. That’s me. I’m one of the.. uh, acrobats.”

“Wonderful! I do love a bit of acrobatics, don’t I, Dr. Litefoot?”

“This is hardly the place to discuss such matters.” his companion replied tersely.

“I changed my mind. I’m robbing _him._ ” Lee grumbled, returning the knife to his coat.

“Very sensible, that.” Mr.Braxiatel nodded, carrying on his way as if nothing had happened.

 

 

 

At ten after ten, a spectacular carriage barrelled through the streets, quite against the traffic that mainly headed towards shops and workplaces. In fact, this one carriage seemed to be drive hell-for-leather to get as far from _Transcendental Academy_ as was possible in a vehicle which was actively ignoring the trends to be as modern as possible, as well as all posted traffic signs.

It looked like something from a bygone age, but it couldn’t decide which one. While Georgian and angled in it’s basic shape, Rococo curls trailed across the panels, encircling a little scene like out of Dante’s Inferno on the doors. The carriage itself was pulled by a team of grey-white beasts which, while vaguely resembling reindeer, looked as if they should have had the word “dire” in their name. The only trouble with calling the whole thing an anachronism was thatit suggested there was a place in history where it wouldn’t have stood out.

The spectacle continued on it’s path for some time, and just when it appeared that nothing would stop the driver from her course, a second vehicle came up abreast of the speeding carriage.Where the carriage was large and impressive, half of it’s velocity sheer mass, the second was somewhat understated, even more by comparison. It was a soot-black giraffe bicycle, the lowest section made up of a motor with a large crank and a tailpipe that left great black smoke behind it like a python hanging in the air. Wherever possible, there were slight suggestions of the infernal, folding black canvas wings that just _might_ allow the bicycle to glide a short distance; but more effectively make the bicycle look like a bat. 

 

The driver of the carriage knew that of the bicycle and considered for a moment just shifting the weight of her trap enough to squash the annoying bicycle and its driver between her carriage and a wall; but decided that she could kill him in a more interesting way that wouldn’t break any of the moulding off of her carriage. She turned off the main road, letting foot traffic scatter before them, and whipped her chargers about to pull the carriage up on the edge of what hand until she pulled across it been a well-maintained bit of garden. Her larger vehicle blocked off the bicycle entirely, and the driver was forced to pull up in such a way that the two were facing one another.

 

The two drivers could now get a proper look at one another. The man on the bicycle looked quite pleased by this, whereas the driver of the carriage looked as if she was picturing his head floating in a vat of formaldehyde. Which to be fair, she was, but she was considering a way to do this in which that he’d be aware of it enough to suffer.

 

He looked every bit the melodrama villain; from his mourning-black top hat and tailcoat, black waistcoat embroidered with golden laurels, to his daft little beard to the walking stick that straddled the line between imposing and absurd. It was black as pitch with more brass gears than could possibly be used in whatever the function of the knobby contraption that served as a handle. The walking stick itself was rather more phallic than necessary, and the apparent joy with which the man handled it did not diminish the effect.

 

By contrast, the woman guiding the carriage was dressed in scarlet brocade trimmed in black velvet and, in places _leather._ Her outfit looked like either a riding habit doing its best to look like a ballgown, or a ballgown heavily modified for driving. A lace panel under the twists of brocade revealed, if you looked close enough, that her black leather boots buckled well over the knee. She wore black leather gloves with insets of red kidskin and a fashionable little hat, trimmed with the feathers of birds which were probably quite extinct. It wouldn’t have stayed attached to her sculpted chestnut coiffure after a drive like that if there were any justice in the world. Her face was beautiful, but not young and not used to smiling, and at this moment she clearly had no interest in starting now. 

 

“Do you want something, Mstr Ainley?” the woman demanded.

“There’s no mistaking that carriage of yours, my dear.” he smiled, “Quite unusual, indeed. And you’re driving it today? I should think that you would have stayed inside and let one of your men handle the reins.”

“I often do.”

“But not today?” he asked, “Why is that, I wonder?”

“If you must know, I am assisting a young lady in a matter that requires some delicacy.”

“Really? Who is inside that carriage, I wonder…” Mstr. Ainley murmured, leaning down slightly.

“Me.” said a young voice from inside the curtained windows. He looked from the window to the driver with some confusion.

“Who is that?” he asked.

“She told you her name.” duchess O’Mara said simply. “Now the both of us must take our leave of you, Mstr. Ainley.”

“When we’ve barely spoken, my darling little Kate?”

“Call me Kate again and a variety of your extremities will be displayed in pickle jars in three separate colleges, Mstr. Ainley.” she replied dispassionately.

“Forgive me, duchess O’Mara, I only intended to quote the bard-”

“If you had, you would have said ‘for you are call'd plain Kate, And bonny Kate, and sometimes Kate the curst; ’ I’ve had the name all my life, you fool. I know the speech.” 

“So you do.”

“And better than you, it seems, though you misquote it whenever there is something you want from me.”

“Whenever have I not wanted something from you? I refer to your friendship, of course.”

 

Duchess O’Mara considered the hundreds of interesting experiments she would like to use Mstr. Ainley as a subject in, and exactly the sort of relationship she had to maintain with him in order that he only bothered her when _she_ wanted something from him. With scientific precision, she decided that something mildly cruel that would make him suffer for a short period, and then convince himself it was just some coy bit of courtship was the best way to achieve this end.

“When I want of you, I shall call on you.” Duchess O’Mara said calmly, leaning slightly off of the seat of her carriage to smooth Mstr. Ainley’s cravat. He seemed quite pleased with this turn of events.

“And not before then.” she finished, giving him a hard shove with the heel of her hand.Ainley rocked back on his bicycle in the way it was not intended to rock, his arms wheeling wildly in the air, knocking off his opera cape in the process. He tried to catch onto something with his cane, but that overbalanced him and finally the whole trap, Ainley, his bicycle, and his cane came tumbling down into a most unfortunate greengrocer’s stall. As final insult, once he had moved one hand enough to be sure he survived the fall, his opera cape came fluttering down like a bird, neatly covering where he had landed.

“And if we are such _excellent_ friends, Anthony, then as a friend I must tell you that you are _painfully_ overdressed for ten o clock in the morning. Good day.” Duchess O’Mara added. She then gave her reins a crack and chirruped to her team, and the duchess’ bizarre coach sped away. 

 

 

 

Dr. Tennent was nearly ready to leave for work at a quarter after ten. Really, the only reason he hadn’t left was a vain hope that he would understand what it was Wilfred was sheepishly explaining, but he had been attempting to since breakfast without any luck. He and his grandchildren had retired to the library, where Dr. Tennent kept being distracted from collecting papers into his valise by the complicated story his grandfather was spinning. Wilf stood clutching his hands like the one schoolboy caught in a prank five or six of them had collaborated on. Far more relaxed than either of them, Donna lounged causally on a sofa with a cup of coffee and a book she wasn’t actually reading, but would look at often enough that her disparaging glances looked more severe when fixed on a person.

 

“…so that’s when you told the cook that you knew how to fix it?”

“Not fix it, exactly.” Wilf explained. “More of… since it wasn’t working, I thought we’d just pull out the old one for the morning, the folding oven that fits over the range?”

“Which was when the smoke started filling the room?”

“No, no. That wasn’t until after it had been on for a bit. It turned out we should have made sure it was empty before we preheated it.”

“Which is when the month-old biscuits caught _fire?_ ”

“And we moved the oven close to the window, to let it vent, see?” Wilf continued. “But the window was open…”

“But what did the knob come off of?” Dr. Tennent asked, his left eyebrow making a game attempt at escaping the rest of his face. Donna looked up from her book.

“Thought you’d know where knobs come off of.”

“ _Donna-!”_ Dr. Tennent squawked.

“That’s it it. The oven started to fall, and I tried to catch it, like you do, you see something falling, you grab it, only I didn’t grab the sides because they were still hot-”

“So you grabbed the dial.”

“The heat knob, yeah. I just reached out and that came to hand, but the oven was already falling…”

“And it sounded like a canon?” Dr. Tennent asked, running a hand through his hair in frustration.

“Well, you’re a man of science, you know how it is, metal box filled with hot air drops out of a third story window into a duck pond…” Wilf finished lamely. Dr. Tennent closed his valise with a sigh. 

“Right. I’ve got to get going if I’m going to talk with Dr. Smith before classes start.” he grumbled. “Could you… could you just see if the gardener can’t get the oven out of the duck pond?”

 

 

There were many things which Dr. Capaldi enjoyed about working at the university. His research into the most arcane and inane subjects went unquestioned. He was provided a place to work, and access to one of the finest libraries in England. He even drew a salary, so long as he usually showed up where he needed to be.

However, it also had a terrible habit of attracting students.

 

At the moment, he was intently focusing on what had started life as a pair of stylish but otherwise very commonplace driving goggles. It was a fashion to wear goggles about at all times, either around your neck or balanced atop your head, and while Dr. Capaldi didn’t understand the fashion, he did recognise that they were very handy things to have around. Truth be told, Dr. Capaldi didn’t understand much about fashion. He had bought himself a very smart suit, either in a blackish blue or a bluish black depending on the light and lined in scarlet. He then proceeded to wear the thing nearly to shreds, occasionally leaving the house in loose checked trousers and a badly done shirt, throwing his coat over and feeling that was quite good enough for a working day. He didn’t understand much about fashion, nor did he care to.

 

But that was all secondary to his opinion on driving goggles. They were available everywhere and he had found them less difficult to lose than any of his tools, because he could conveniently leave them on the top of his head. So, he had decided, he was going to add as many possible uses to his goggles so that he would have as many tools as possible when he forget to have any tools with him at all. This resulted in the goggles slowly becoming larger and more complex, which Dr. Capaldi either did not notice or mind.

 

The old man was intently focused on adding a magnifying glass on a an arm that could be lowered as needed to the goggles, so that he would not need to carry a loupe with him for detail work. With the result that he needed the use of a loupe as he worked. Dr. Capaldi was so focused on his work that it wasn’t until the second repetition of his name that he realised there was someone in the room with him.

 

She appeared to be a young woman to Dr. Capaldi, but he wasn’t terrible good at guessing age. Or race. Or gender. Or whether or not he had ever spoken with the person before. He was only vaguely aware that she was blonde, tall, and wearing an expression as serious as her dress.

 

“Are you Dr. Capaldi?” she asked.

“No, I’m Dr. Basil Funkenstien.” he replied sarcastically, turning back to continue work on the goggles. “What do you want?”

“I was told that you give music lessons.” 

“By _who?”_ he asked skeptically.

“By my father, as it happens.” she paused significantly here. “Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart.”

Dr. Capaldi stopped his work and looked up, attempting to see the woman properly. Sadly, strong intent did little to improve his prosopagnosia, but upon being reminded of the fact, he did recall Lethbridge-Stewart mentioning a daughter to him once or twice. The memory of it softened his mood considerably. He set the goggles on the table and removed the loupe from his eye.

“Sit down.” he offered with a smile, indicating a stool at the other end of his workbench as he stood. “There’s still forty minutes until the first bell. Let me fetch my guitar.” 

 

 

 

 

Dr. McGann was the first one to admit that his morning was getting ridiculous. He had returned home, teared through his belongings, but could not remember for the life of him what he had gone home to pick up this time. His mind ran through the other times he had returned home, and what he had picked up: his valise, and yes the papers were inside it, there was the pot of tea that he made so he would at least have something warm inside him before he went out, and now that it had gone cold he drank a cup of it and poured out the rest. There was his pocket-watch, now tucked safely in his pocket, there was the handkerchief monogrammed with the red question mark of his gentleman’s club, there was nothing he could remember that he needed to go home to get, only that he _had_ gone home to get something. He gave up on remembering it, and rather desperately caught an omnibus. He checked his pocket-watch, it was now ten-thirty and he did have to rush if he was going to get his classroom in order before his eleven o clock class.

 

Idly, he noticed that a little girl, no older than seven, was staring very intently at him. She wore pigtailed, a sailor dress that didn’t fully cover her bloomers, and an extremely serious expression. He wasn’t terribly surprised by this, many people stared at him when he went out in public, and more often than not, they were children. Children often didn’t learn not to make eye contact with strangers lest they turn out to be madmen until they were around the age of ten. The small child leaned towards it’s mother, staring directly at Dr. McGann and not lowering her voice even a little, in that charming way that children have.

“Mummy, why hasn’t that man got any shoes on?” the girl asked. Dr. McGann slowly turned his head towards his feet. Shoes. That’s what he’d forgotten. Slowly, as if the man were deflating, he covering his face with one hand and sank so deeply into his seat that he was nearly folded over. The girl kept on staring, wondering if she was about to witness a grown man crying, shoeless, on public transport. It would make an excellent image to earnestly recount to every other adult she met that day.

 

 

 

It was a truth most academics politely avoided that behind most successful men of science there was a extremely frustrated secretary. While Dr. McGann was only making one wait for him, Dr. Baker had so much frustration to inspire that he shared it between miss de Votredundar and miss de Votredundar. Not five minutes after Dr. McGann had turned around again, miss Romana de Votredundar found herself in one of the best offices in all of Transcendental Academy, brimming with half made notes and inventions but conspicuously devoid of Dr. Baker.

Leela sat behind Dr. Baker’s desk, her legs folded beneath her and very kindly seeing to it that the pot of tea Dr. Baker wanted in his office at ten thirty wasn’t being put to waste for lack of the professor. She also had the forethought to make sure those ginger biscuits he had in his drawer weren’t going to waste, either. 

 

On the other side of the room, miss de Votredundar was making the study as tidy as it possibly could be without distracting her employer, which fortunately wasn’t terribly tidy at all, so she didn’t have much to do. At the moment, she was copying down the diagrams and formulae that Dr. Baker had scribbled on the board into a blank book, in a much cleaner hand than Dr. Baker had done. There were a few mistakes in his math, which Romana politely assumed were merely an oversight and copied down the correct answers.

 

Leela heard the noise first, perking up like a doe hearing a branch break across the clearing.

“The doctor comes.” she announced. “His chariot approaches.”

“Thank you Leela, but while your hearing is remarkable, Dr. Baker’s vehicle is difficult to mistake for anything else.” miss de Votredundar replied, not looking up from her transcription. A moment later a stream of babble, deep, resonating babble but babble nonetheless started from the stairwell, getting louder and closer with every loud foot fall of what Leela easily recognised as a tall man wearing boots and jogging along for no reason other than the fact he could.

“That would be him.” miss de Votredundar said calmly, closing the book.

 

The door burst open like a cracker, though it was unclear whether Dr. Baker was the prize or the riddle, standing proudly with his mad scarf and his half-moon grin.

“Good morning, good morning!” he said to each woman in turn. They repeated the phrase back, their words overlapping.

“Would you like to review your notes on lighter than air travel before your lecture?” Romana asked, offering him the papers.

“Not particularly.” he grinned.

“Your class is at forty after eleven.” said Romana, “Here are your notes, I’ve organised them for your convenience. And Leela, if you could fetch another pot of tea we’d all appreciate it.”

“Why am I sent to make tea?” Leela asked, slightly offended. “I am not an old woman.”

“Because you’re in my seat, that’s why.” said Dr. Baker in friendly tone. Leela nodded solemnly, accepting this logic, and took the teapot in one hand as she climbed over Dr. Baker’s desk and out the door. Like the tracker she was, she didn’t rustle a single paper in doing so, so neither Dr. Baker nor miss de Votredundar saw any reason to comment.

 

 

 

 

It was largely a matter of coincidence that classes started at Coal Hill at roughly the same time that the did at Transcendental Academy. Certainly no one planned it, even though two of the professors at the academy found it very convent to have their wards at class at the same time that they were. With twenty minutes before the bell, several girls had gathered in the courtyard, enjoying what little fresh air they were likely to get until school was out. It was quite a pretty picture, several blossoms of youth gathered around the rose bushes in avid conversation. They were all dressed in the handsome maroon uniform, a modest but very pretty dress for all its simplicity.

 

Susan Foreman had already found her best friend, and now she and Ping Cho were seated, holding hands, and discussing the fantastic dream Susan had the night before. Ping Cho was very pleased that she was in it, but did wish that Susan would calm down a bit and breathe properly between sentences.

Not far off, another group of girls was gathered around a blonde teenager in pigtails. She had a basket on her lap, and on occasion, the basket would move. Nyssa jumped back with a start, which made Dorothy Chaplet giggle.

“Come on, Vicki, don’t leave us in suspense!” she insisted. “What have you caught this time?”

“I do hope it’s a least a little tame this time.” Nyssa commented warily.

“That poor thing _was_ tame, Nyssa, you just startled it.” Vicki insisted.

“The feeling was quite mutual, once it had run up my leg!” Nyssa protested.

“He was just cold, that’s all!” Vicki insisted. “The poor thing lost so much of his coat in the glue trap.”

“Well, I do hope whatever you’ve caught now is quite warm enough where it is.”

“She perfectly cosy in the basket.” Vicki insisted, opening it up. “Look, I’ve got a blanket around her…” The three of them nearly bumped heads as they all tried to look into the basket at once. Nyssa did her best to muffle a scream, lest she startle _this_ one.

“Isn’t see _adorable?_ ” Vicki cooed.

“Once you get past the fangs, I suppose.” Dodo replied thoughtfully.

 

Zoe Heriot was the only one _not_ talking with the other girls, rather she was seated on the steps of the school and very intently reading a book. It wasn’t that she was aloof, in fact part of her was very keen to join the conversation, but she found herself at a loss as to how to do that. She looked out sadly at the group, and was quite embarrassed to have caught Nyssa’s eyes. Zoe looked right back down at her book, trying to look as if she hadn’t actually been staring. She was told that her stare could be a bit unsettling, and while she didn’t normally care, when she was already feeling out of place the last thing she needed was a reminder. To make matters worse, Nyssa was coming towards her.

 

“I don’t mean to bother you, Zoe, but I couldn’t help but notice that you were reading _A Dissertation on the Flora of Lost Islands._ ”

“I know it’s rather heavy reading for our year, but I had heard so much about it…”

“No no,” Nyssa nodded. “I’ve read it, it’s quite excellent!” Zoe smiled hopefully. 

“Have you read the section on Fire Hibiscus yet?” Nyssa asked earnestly. Zoe smiled, closing the book in her lap and nodding.

 

 

 

Miss Shaw was not in habit of waiting for Dr. Pertwee to arrive before she starting working in the laboratory. While officially she was listed as his assistant, she had spent the past several years working more in the function of partner. 

After all, any assistance that he required more on the “transposing notes, telling him when he was being brilliant and when he was being childish, and reminding him to take breaks when he started making silly mistakes” end of things, and that function was expertly filled by miss Grant. Some of the school board questioned the expense of Dr. Pertwee keeping two assistants, while others felt it was perfectly acceptable so long as one of them was on the military payroll and the other the school’s. Which one was which never seemed to be settled on, and miss Shaw was slightly concerned about this.

But the last time miss Shaw had checked in on the school board’s decision making process, she found that for some reason, Mr. Letts was physically restraining miss Lambert from strangling Mr. Moffat, as Mr. Turner cheered her decision. It was suspected that it wasn’t that Mr. Turner disliked Mr. Moffat so much as he enjoyed a bit of sporting violence. Meanwhile, Mr. Davies was engrossed in cheerful conversation with a wall, who appeared to be in complete agreement with him. After that experience, miss Shaw had decided that it was best not to know how the school board came to its decisions.

 

The scientific journal she was reading at the moment was not much more hopeful in regards to maturity in the workplace and academia in general. She had been only too eager to take up this particular publication, as it focused largely on the various achievements in academia which could be traced to women. They were on the brink of a new Enlightened age, and as a woman of science she could not help but feel pleased that it appeared that in this Enlightenment, women would play a part that was no only vital, but recognised. While it did not come out as often as she would like, she was very much heartened by the work of her fellow lady scholars. Sadly, it seemed that miss Smith, the most regular writer, could only sell one story on new discoveries as she could two on the manufactured rivalry between misses Summerfield and Song. “Manufactured”, miss Shaw saw it, because she had spoken to each of them on separate occasions, and while neither ofthem was eager to discuss the other, it seemed more out of lack of interest than any animosity. But a rivalry sold, and the number of archaeology sites each had worked on were displayed like football scores on the front page.

At quarter to eleven, miss Shaw set down the scientific journal she had until that moment been reading because miss Grant had just run through the laboratory, screaming, with an octopus on her head. There would need to be a lot of explanation on the part of miss Grant, but first, miss Shaw decided, the octopus needed to returned to its tank.

“Miss Grant! Jo, Jo it’s me, stop running!” miss Shaw exclaimed, chasing her coworker around a lab bench. Jo didn’t seem quite aware of where she was going, but evidently she had heard miss Shaw because cries of“Help, Lizzie, help!” joined what had until then been wordless screams. Once Liz had a hand on Jo’s shoulder, however, she was able to start coaxing the tentacles off of her face. Slowly, each sucker broke off of Jo’s body and the octopus fells limply against miss Shaw’s chest.

“There, that’s the last of it.” said miss Shaw, freeing the last tentacle. “How on Earth didthat even happen?”

 

Before miss Grant could answer, a blonde woman with an exasperated expression knocked on the doorframe of Dr. Pertwee’s lab. Miss Shaw paused, holding the naughty cephalopod to her chest, where it seemed entirely too content for an aquatic creature out of water.

“Dr. McGann hasn’t popped up in here, right?” asked miss Miller, fully expecting to hear “no”.

“I can’t say I’ve seen him, Lucie.” said miss Grant, patting the sore red marks on her face. Lucie looked confused.

“Then again, I can’t say I’ve seen much of anything today.”

“Miss Grant had an altercation with one of our specimens.” miss Shaw explained. This seemed to remind her she was holding an octopus like an infant, and she returned it to it’s tank. The octopus, having survived a near dehydration experience, shot off through the water, made a tight turn and hid itself completely in what had been a milk jug until it was added to the tank. Lucie wrinkled her nose at the tentacles pressed against the semi-opaque glass.

“Never did like those things… most things that live in the sea are better off stayin’ there, I think.”

“Yes, weren’t you helping Dr. McGann on a project of that nature?” asked miss Shaw.

“We _were._ ” miss Miller grumbled. “We were supposed to be finishin’ it up today, but the stupid fool’s not here yet. I was checkin’ around to see if he went to the wrong classroom again.”

“I hope he’s alright…” Jo murmured, rubbing the last red welt on her cheek.

“Well, if we see him, we’ll tell him you’re looking for him.” Liz said evenly.

“Bleedin’ hell…” she grumbled, moving on. “What do you want to bet he’s still at home in his pyjamas…”

 

 

Ten minutes until the start of classes at Transcendental Academy, most of the teachers had made it to the campus. There were two exceptions to this were in fact Dr. McGann, who while not in his pyjamas was neither in his classroom, and the younger of the Baker brothers. And when Dr. Baker was late for something, the entire staff knew about it. If the house had been smaller, then the neighbours would have known as well. And with his wife adding to the din, a few of the staff found themselves wondering if perhaps they did anyway. The chaos spread out from the bedroom, and from there, it rippled through the house like the surface of tea once a lump of sugar was added.  

 

Polonius, who was a cat, came running out of the Bakers’ private rooms and ran straight over Gertrude, who was also a cat. With various hisses of dismay, the entire cast of _Hamlet_ and most of _Midsummer Night’s Dream_ scattered through the house. Canis Lupis perked up at hearing the sound of startled felines, and came running towards the centre of the panic, chanting “- _cat cat cat cat cat cat-_ ” as he ran. His voice, however, was soon lost under the Bakers’.

 

“ _I_ made _you_ late?” Mrs. Baker demanded.

“Of course you did!” Dr. Baker shouted back. While it would have been untrue to say the Dr. Baker hadn’t been quite busy that morning, only the last half hour had been devoted to dressing, eating, shouting, and generally anything that could not be done while he was still in bed.  

The man came running out of the bedroom in his shirtsleeves, a waistcoat in one hand and a coat which no other man in London would have dared owned in the other. As he ran, attempting to fasten his suspenders to his trousers despite the fact his hands were full, the spectacularly patterned frock-coat flapped behind him. In a similar fashion, his wife came trailing behind the coat, as dressed as she could manage in ten minutes without the aid of anyone but her rather distracted husband. Mrs. Baker had a lot of difficulty keeping a ladies’ maid for any period of time, mostly due to the utter chaos which was a perpetual state of the Baker household.

She actually got on rather well with the last one until the people she had left Egypt to avoid found and revealed she was entirely too high born to be serving and entirely too on the wrong side of the current government to be in Egypt, and neither she nor her pursuers had been heard from since. The current model was named Claudia Bruderbakker, who had the benefit of knowing more about fashion than any sane person needed to, coming from the same country as Mrs. Brown and a fierce need to prove to her father she could hold down a job. Miss Bruderbakker had not been with the family long, and as such hadn’t figured out the right time to come between Mrs. Baker and her husband and remind them a dress really ought to be between them as well. As such, the ladies’ maid was actually running in the opposite direction of the warring couple, in hoping that Mrs. Baker would at some point finish shouting at her husband and return to her wardrobe to dress properly. 

 

“Just how do you figure _I_ was the one making _you_ late, buster ‽ ”

“Because I’m the one who needs to be at the university before the hour changes and you were the one… _dawdling_ for half the morning!”

“Oh? Is that what we’re calling it now?” she laughed mirthlessly. “If you’re so against it, that’s the last ‘dawdling’ you’re going to see for some time!” 

Dr. Baker rounded on her with a furious expression.

“Don’t threaten me with _that_!” he shouted.

“And why not?” she snapped. “I can threaten you with whatever I like, you don’t hold back in arguments so why should I start?” There was a slight pause as Claudia tried to make it back into the bedroom and failed not to catch Mrs. Baker’s eye, despite the fact that she was still facing her husband.

 

“Claudia, I saw you back there!” Peri shouted, not turning around. “Can you _please_ ring Mrs. Smythe and get some toast or something in the carriage so this idiot doesn’t starve to death on the drive?”

“Make it cake!” Dr. Baker added, pulling on his waistcoat.

“Oh, you really think you’re getting cake this morning?” she asked skeptically, coming forward to do the buttons.

“It’s my house, Perpugilliam, and I’ll do what I like.” Dr. Baker said hotly, fitting an arm into his jacket.

“It is your father’s house, and are you saying that what you like includes showing up for work an hour late?” Peri asked snidely as she slipped his pocket watch into his waistcoat pocket.

“I’m tenured, else they would have sacked me already.” he muttered, patting his pockets for the lapel pin.

“I suppose that means you’re tenured here as well, then?” Peri smirked, slipping his cravat around his neck for him.

“Oh, my class won’t mind,” Dr. Baker scoffed, attaching a minute bust of a cat to the front of his jacket. “They make no effort to hide their animosity for me.”

“Rude.” Peri replied, smoothing his collar. “They should at least make an effort. I guess they are learning something from you after all.”

“Nothing that wouldn’t be better learned at your knee, I’m sure.” he replied, slipping his hands around his wife’s waist.

“I could teach you something at my knee…” she stood on tiptoe to mutter this against his cheek.

“You have, that’s precisely why I’m late.” Dr. Baker placed a kiss on Peri’s mouth and left the room, coat flaring behind him.

“You are an ass!” Peri shouted after him, by way of a goodbye.

“And you married me!” he shouted back.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wanted to include Erimem as Peri’s lady’s maid as sort of “Duchess below stairs” thing, but she was having none of it. They only way I can see working her into this AU is a foreign dignitary visiting Dr. Davison. So instead, we got Claudia Brudebakker from Synthespians. I’m not sure why her, beyond Peri having an American lady’s maid made sense.


	7. The Bellower Strikes Eleven

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Classes start at Transcendental Academy. This chapter features the Baker brothers, Dr. Davison, Dr. Hartnell, miss Miller and Dr. McGann. This concludes "Waking Up".

At eleven o clock exactly, classes started at Transcendental Academy. Most of the teachers were even present for it. Even those who attended that club which had a notorious reputation for being rather poor keepers of time. In fact, there was only two of them not present for the bell.

 

Dr. Hartnell’s lecture on history started nearly as soon as the bell rang. A few students looked about and held whispered conversations about whether or not they should remind Dr. Hartnell to take attendance, but those were quickly hushed. Both by their classmates and Dr. Hartnell. The old man spoke very animatedly and often loudly, though he missed several words.

 

“Now you see, yes, you see the interesting thing about the French Revolution, the Terror as it was called, was not simply called the Terror because of the war going on. No no no. You see, the revolutionaries, hm they had some very interesting ideas about how to make a more perfect France. Very interesting ideas indeed, hoohoo!” he laughed like a manic owl.

“It was all quite violent, quite violent indeed. They thought they would decimate time and decimalise the the people. It was the first time that decimalised time was used in Western society, and it was perhaps not as successful as they may have liked. Much like their attempts of 

by lowering and traumatising the population. Dear oh dear. Such needless bloodshed, but such very interesting results, from an historian’s standpoint! And we must remember, at all times, that we are historians, for as I often say, rational analysis of the past is the only way current sciences currently let us see our future!”

 

 

 

“I will repeat once more, _please_ hold your comments until the end of the lecture or at least until the end of my sentence!” Dr. Davison squeaked irritably. Those familiar with Dr. Davison knew that once he started squeaking, there was little reasoning with him and perhaps it was best to let him run his course on this particular lecture. A few of the students looked around uncomfortably. They hadn’t expected much of a morning, some of them were quite keen on sleeping, slacking or otherwise not studying through this class. But that wasn’t going to happen with Dr. Davison there. 

The trouble was, Dr. Davison was giving a lecture on human physiology and this was actually Dr. Baker’s class on abnormal psychology. The trouble was, Dr. Baker, having gotten off to a late start, was still some distance from the campus and when Dr. Davison found an empty classroom he just started teaching without making sure he was now in the right room. Meanwhile, Dr. Davison’s class was sitting in a room that smelled vaguely of tobacco and wondering where their professor was.

 

 

 

While the younger Dr. Baker was late, the older brother was quite happily holed up in his office doing nothing. Dr. Baker’s first class wasn’t until 11:40, and he was insistent that he didn’t need to prepare for it. Miss de Vortelundar wasn’t having any of it. 

“I don’t see how it matters overly much, Romana.” he replied, leaning back at his desk. “I’m paid the same regardless of what I say.”

“Yes, but I’m not paid the same if you don’t say something related to the title of the class at least once a semester.” she replied, dropping a leaflet of papers on the desk. Dr. Baker looked at them curiously for a moment, looked at miss de Vortelundar, then removed his boots from the desk and picked up the paper.

“What’s this?” he asked, flipping through it.

“It’s you notes, Dr. Baker.” she said crisply. “I’ve organised them for you into a cognisant train of thought that could be delivered as a lecture relevant to your 11:40 class.” Dr. Baker frowned and leafed through the papers.

“That hardly seems necessary.” he said, leaning back and loosening his grip on the paper. 

“If you throw those in the air you will be the one picking them up.” she warned. His shoulders drooped and he sat at his desk properly, with his feet under it.

“I had no intention of it.” he lied. Then, under his secretary’s watchful eye he made a show of proving her wrong and reading the notes. He even changed some phrasing about, that would really show that he took his job seriously. Or at least, that he was willing to on occasion.

 

 

 

Dr. McGann ran flat out into the lecture hall, his valise swinging behind him. He was late, he knew he was late, but that couldn’t be helped. All he could really say on the matter was that today he was only five minutes late, which was a slight improvement. And at least he finally had his shoes on, and yes—they _did_ fit perfectly. Perfectly for running into his first lecture five minutes late, with no time at all to work on his article. 

 

Standing at the front of his desk wearing a neat walking suit and a distressed expression, miss Miller addressed the collected students. They looked slightly befuddled to see her taking the place of their professor in the first lecture of the day. Dr. McGann thought that was odd, since this was hardly the first time it had happened. Once she caught sight of Dr. McGann, her expression shifted from uncomfortable stalling to barely contained fury.

“And that concludes our attendance roll. Feel free _not_ to welcome our regular lecturer, Dr. McGann.”

“Yes, thank you miss Miller.” he said hurriedly, vaulting his desk and scattering papers everywhere. 

“Where in bleedin’ hell have you been?” she hissed, taking his valise from him and stowing it under the desk. 

“Halfway across London and just about everywhere except this lecture hall.” he said hurriedly, trying to make some sense of the desk. “I’m afraid that I got lost at some point.”

“The teachers dormitories are barely at the edge of campus! You can see this hall from the dorm, how did you get lost again?”

“Pure talent, it seems.”

 

There was a laugh somewhere in the lecture hall.

“Oi, this is college and part of that includes runnin’ in late for lectures!” miss Miller shouted in the direction it came from. “And that applies for professors as much as students.”

“Thank you, miss Miller. Beautifully put. I think perhaps I had better take over at this point?”

“Yes, I think perhaps you better had!” she replied in a mocking attempt at his accent.

“This is the lecture on deep sea lifeforms, is it?” he asked.

“No, this is the lecture on Greek mythology, idiot!” she hissed, all but throwing a textbook at him. He caught it deftly and looked at it as if he had never seen a book before. Miss Miller then took the professor by the shoulders, pointed him at the students and whispered, “Justopen it and start babbling, you’re good at that!”

Dr. McGann opened the book, looked down, then looked up at the students. He cleared his throat. 

“Today’s lecture will focus on one of the figures in the Orphic cult of ancient Greece. While sometimes identified with Dionysus, Zagreus is considered by many modern scholars to be a separate entity…”

 

 

 

At twenty-four minutes after the first classes started, Dr. Baker hurried into the lecture hall where he was supposed to be teaching a class on abnormal psychology. This managed, where all else had failed, to make Dr. Davison stop giving his lecture. The two professors stared at one another for a moment.

“What _precisely_ are you doing, Dr. Davison?”

“I- I’m teaching my first class.” he answered, somewhat shakily. “Shouldn’t you be doing the same?”

“Yes.” Dr. Baker said coldly, crossing to the desk. “I s _hould.”_

Dr. Baker leaned across the table and growled at Dr. Davison.

“ _Peter, this is my class.”_ At first, Dr. Davison started to correct his colleague for addressing him informally in front of the students. Then what he had actually said worked through his head. His eyes flicked to the students. He was perhaps not the best keeper of young people, rarely asking questions so long as he left with the same number he came with. He had once left Adric at a shop for three hours that way.But now, looking at the expressions of the students, Dr. Davison became dully aware this was not his eleven o clock human physiology class.

“Ah.” he said quietly.

“Ah indeed.” Dr. Baker repeated tersely. Awkwardly, Dr. Davison collected his papers and ran out of the room. Dr. Baker watched him leave, then turned his attention back to his class. They stared blankly at him, so he turned to write something on the board.

 

A piece of crumpled paper was launched at the back of Dr. Baker’s head, missing by inches. He whirled around and started shouting.

“I’ve had enough of this! You’re eighteen years old on average and it’s high time you started acting like it! In your adult lives you will have to listen to _a lot_ of people you do not care for, many of whom will be signing your paycheques, so the sooner you learn to hide your animosity the sooner you’ll be able to join polite society! Look at me! Do you think I _like_ any of you? Why should I, the way you treat me? But I still give this damnable lectures, and you _will_ listen to them!”

He continued in that vein for some time, shouting a long speech that rattled the doors of the next hall over and prompted Dr. McCoy to cough and raise his voice slightly to be heard. It fed into the various noises heard about campus, from the dry coughs of Dr. Hartnell as he spoke to the creaking of floorboards as someone snuck into Dr. Capaldi’s class late, to the twittering of birds outside the Prussian blue spires of Transcendental Academy.

 

And the world was awake.

 


End file.
